Time to Fix the Mistakes
by DisobedienceWriter
Summary: ABANDONED. Two years after the Death Hallows Epilogue, tragedy strikes Harry Potter and his family. The only way to set things right is to journey back to the time before he was born. Not for Ginny enthusiasts. Time Travel. Avenging!Harry.
1. Even the Hardest Stones Crumble

**Time to Fix the Mistakes**

A/N: The Deathly Hallows Epilogue was truly unsatisfying. Here's the rest of the story that begins about two years after the DH Epilogue. Not for Ginny enthusiasts. Character Deaths. Time Travel. Avenging!Harry.

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**Chapter 1: Even the Hardest Stones Crumble**

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_July 31, 2018_

Harry Potter was enjoying his Sunday morning. He had just turned thirty-eight years old. He had three wonderful children and a wife he loved. He had a quiet morning planned before the boisterous party occurred in the afternoon and early evening.

His wife loved birthday parties…even for her 'oldest child,' Harry.

"Speak of the devil…" Harry murmured when Ginny came into Harry's study with a plate full of something that smelled good.

"I baked it fresh this morning…"

"It smells lovely, but isn't it a touch early for birthday cake?"

Ginny gave an odd sort of laugh. "It's coffee cake, silly. Blueberry and cinnamon. Found the recipe in one of mum's old books."

Harry lit up in a smile. "I always did love Molly's cooking." Harry pulled the plate from his wife's hand and took a bite.

Ginny looked at her husband as he chewed.

"We'll have chocolate cake for pudding after dinner…"

"Brilliant."

Ginny walked out of the room and Harry quickly spat out the disgusting coffee cake. It had smelled so promising, too. He loved Ginny, he really did, but she surely hadn't inherited her mother's talent for cooking and baking.

"I hope she got the elves to bake the birthday cake," Harry muttered.

The cake had certainly not been very sweet and had a rather unpleasant, even metallic taste to it. Par for the course. Ginny managed to screw up nearly every kind of baked good. The kitchen was usually the domain of the elves or Harry. The lessons he had learned the hard way at the hands and fists of the Dursleys were ones he still practiced.

Harry did try to ensure his children had some skill in the kitchen. He had taught all three of his children some basic cooking skills… He smiled thinking about his little brood. He loved each of his children: his Gryffindor James, his Ravenclaw Albus, and his Hufflepuff Lily. Each was a perfect person, flaws and all. James smiled thinking of the time the three of them had last pranked him: a hair growth potion did have quite a few possible uses, didn't it?

He'd wanted a larger family, but Ginny hadn't become pregnant again. Such is Potter-style luck.

He contented himself with three beautiful children…

The thought stopped in his head as he suddenly felt sick to his stomach. He was also in severe pain which just added to his wave of nausea.

He stumbled to his feet. "Ginny," he called out.

He made it downstairs before he was doubled over in pain. Then he came across the dining room. His children…his beautiful children…were all seated, slumped forward, but none of them were breathing.

"Help! Ginny, help."

Harry slumped against the table. His hand was out feeling for Albus' pulse. Nothing. James had none. Little Lily…oh, god. She was dead as well.

"Ginny!"

Finally Harry saw his wife saunter slowly from the kitchen.

"You're still moving, Harry? I wouldn't have expected that with the dose I gave you…"

"You? You killed my children?"

Ginny laughed. "You think I wanted to be a brood mare for your messy haired children? I had a career before I married you, Harry, now I can go back to Quidditch and have the Potter fortune and fame to my name. The sad widow. Because of the stupid Potter entailment rules, I just had to wait for the last child to reach age 12 before I enacted my little plan. Otherwise I'd have done this years earlier, you foolish –"

At that, Harry wandlessly broke his wife's neck. He was crying in pain and grief for his children, but he'd never shed a tear for _that_ woman. If he survived this, he would pay to have her soul excised by a necromancer. All remnants of her life and soul should be removed from the world.

He summoned his wand from his study and began sending Patronus messaging spells out as fast as he could manage. He called for the Potter elves for help. He then clutched his nearest child, poor little Albus, as he succumbed to the darkness.

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_August 3, 2018_

Harry woke up in St. Mungo's three days after his children died – and he executed his wife for familial betrayal (which the purebloods of old had put and kept on the books as a crime).

Harry was visited by his Healers first, but he couldn't even ask about his own condition.

"Did my children suffer?"

Healer Magnusson tried to shake his head, but he ended up shrugging. "They each consumed the cake, where you only had some in your mouth before spitting it out. I'd suspect the compound acted quickly…"

"What did she poison us with?"

"We're still trying to figure it out, Mr. Potter. The Aurors found the remainder of that vile concoction in the kitchen…"

"I don't care what it costs. Find out. I have to know how she destroyed my family…" Harry wasn't crying at this, but his voice was filled with emotion stronger than mere anger.

"I'm very sorry, Mr. Potter."

"Thank you." It was genuine, but the Healer left the room wondering if Harry would have preferred not surviving the poisoning.

Kingsley Shacklebolt and the leaders of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement were next.

"Harry," the Minister of Magic tried to begin.

"I know why you're here. Bring me a pensieve and my wand and I'll show you…"

One of the Auror Captains, Urdroot, already had the stone basin in his arms. Harry pulled the memory from his head and dropped it into the rune-carved receptacle.

Several heads went inside and several heads came out minutes later with shock and revulsion writ large. "I've known her for twenty years. I never would have thought…" Kingsley said.

"Check her corpse for the usual signs of Imperius or other mind control spells or potions," Harry said. "I don't think you'll find them. She seemed normal in my study – and then insane after my children were dead. She was an actress in the worst sense of the word. I don't think she's been right in the head for a long time, if ever."

Kingsley tried to coax Harry into talking as one friend to another, but Harry bucked and weaved his way through every question. As Kingsley was leaving, Harry said one last thing. "I'll be back in the office in a few days, Minister, but I'll be turning in my resignation. I can't do this any more…"

"Heal for now, Harry. We'll talk more about that when you get out."

Then, for his final act of his hellish day, he had three reporters summoned, along with another pensieve.

"I want the true story of what happened to be reported. My attorney, Lord Stanhope, is documenting this entire meeting. Here is my memory of what happened…"

The journalists came out of the experience even more traumatized than Harry would have expected.

"Let it be known that Ginny Weasley is forever banished from the House of Potter for familial betrayal. May the wraiths of hell hunt her down."

It was only the oldest of the pureblood families that ever used post-mortem disownment, but Harry knew all of the laws and customs. For his old job as Head Auror, he'd had to know them all.

He took a Dreamless Sleep and slept for twelve hours. No dreams meant no tears.

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_August 8, 2018 – August 10, 2018_

When Harry walked out of the hospital five days later – as the poison had done hard-to-heal damage to most of his internal organs – there were reporters outside waiting to talk to him. But the glamour Harry used allowed him to pass them all by without a second glance.

Harry mourned his children with every step, but he could no longer think of having a family in this life. His entire world was shattered. Every person became a potential betrayer. Every person was a potential enemy.

In the days that followed, Harry closed the home he'd purchased when he and _that woman_ had started a family. He scheduled a private funeral for his beloved children in Godric's Hollow, next to the markers for his parents and the one he'd laid to Sirius Black's memory. The stones for Remus and Nymphadora Lupin were a few rows over. This sad place now contained Harry's only family, all dead.

The morning dawned clear and beautiful. Harry put on his nicest Muggle suit. He would get through the ceremony for his children. He had to. He would cast his spells of blessing and of physical protection. He would make their gravestones the most memorable things he could.

He apparated to an abandoned shop near to the cemetery. He opened the door with his magic and stepped out and walked to the cemetery. Very few people had been notified.

The Weasleys had not been told the day and time of the service. Harry wasn't sure if he could manage seeing auburn hair right now. (He'd heard that _she_ had been buried four days ago. _She_ deserved to be fed to the crows.)

Neville and Luna were already there as was Teddy Lupin, Harry's godson. A very elderly Filius Flitwich had also come. His old Charms professor had retired five years earlier and wouldn't likely live out another year. Kingsley showed up just a moment after Harry arrived. His children's former tutor, Madeleine Catchbasket, was the last to arrive.

Harry himself conducted the brief graveside memorial.

"…Those are the stories I remember of my children. Their beauty and puckishness, their brilliance and stubbornness. Their love of jokes, stories, pranks, and living life to the fullest. If I lived a hundred lifetimes, I would never find three children I adored more. They were robbed from me, from you, and from this world. I promise today that I will never forget and I will move mountains to give them some form of peace in the afterlife."

Harry stepped forward, wand in hand, and began casting the spells to settle his children's caskets into the ground – to seal them, to protect them, to comfort their mortal remains in the only way he had left.

He spoke with everyone who'd come to the service. Harry stayed strong for his babies.

Minister Shacklebolt was the last of the people to stop by to extend his condolences. Harry listened to the kind words.

"Minister, may I come by your office tomorrow sometime to have that discussion?"

Kingsley looked surprised for a moment before he remembered what Harry was referencing. The Minister nodded sadly. "I hope I can talk you out of something that will make you miserable."

"Well, we'll see."

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_August 11, 2018_

"…Harry, you know I owe you my position…"

"No, Minister, you got the unrewarding task all on your own merits." Harry's voice was somber, but slightly tinged with dark mirth.

"Not true, Harry. I served as the Interim Minister for two years after the war. Then I got booted to the Wizengamot, eventually becoming the Chief Warlock. But you brought down Minister Shipley with your corruption probe…and that basically brought me out of my Wizengamot dotage."

Harry just nodded. If that's the way the Minister wanted to see history, there wasn't much Harry could do.

Kingsley tried reapproaching the topic. "You were the one to push for the two pronged strategy after the war, Harry. The truth telling commission and amnesty for those who'd never killed or raped; combined with a redefinition of the Dark Arts that freed up entire branches of magic for renewed study, while increasing the penalties on all the parts that were genuinely considered Dark Arts. You're the reason there are now fifteen Unforgivable Curses and Rituals, Harry. You're the reason that Muggleborns are taught wizarding culture and traditions and why all purebloods are taught Muggle science, history, and such."

"Then the world is a better place for the things I accidentally crusaded for. But, now, it's time for me to bow out…"

"What are your plans? You can't live in the past. It'll wither you, Harry."

"My plans are my own, Minister, but I thank you for inquiring…"

The Minister rubbed at his temples. "I know you hate the fame, Harry, but you are a public person, especially after this disaster. You won't be left alone…"

"I'll be left alone, Minister, to finish my work. I can take care of myself."

"You won't be happy, Harry." His tone of voice suggested Kingsley thought this his best, his final, argument.

"Kingsley, sir, I don't think I'll ever be able to be happy again."

"Time will dull…"

Harry stood up from his seated position. "Sir, I'm afraid it won't. You have my letter of retirement. I assume I'll retain privileges relating to the use of the Ministry's libraries?"

Kingsley bit his lip. He just nodded. "I'll sit on this letter for a week, Harry. Take some time and rethink this."

"Since the horror happened, it's all I can think of. Nothing else matters, I'm afraid. Good day, Minister."

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_September 30 – December 19, 2018_

Harry had both disappeared from the wizarding world and become a totem for its continued change. People realized that they agreed with what Harry wanted to do, but no longer had him around to do the simple, impossible things he attempted on a monthly basis. Other people began to step up.

Harry was still around, though no one knew it. He found his mind locked in the past, not just on his most recent personal tragedy but the one that had stolen his parents from him as well. It was a bit easier to think of his parents' tragedy rather than the recent, bitter one Harry had felt.

He read trial transcripts from the Death Eater trials.

He read family histories: the Bones, the Prewetts, the McKinnons, and the histories of the eleven old wizarding families that had been completely extinguished during the first war.

He read reports from orphanages and the appropriate volumes of the _Annals of Hogwarts_ and thousands of pages of bureaucratic output from the Ministry of Magic decades earlier.

Then he went to the Ministry's 'secure archives' and retrieved old Auror reports. He looked at individual battles, the tactics they claimed to use, and all the minutiae.

Harry's perception of his world began to change.

The Death Eaters used Unforgivables and 'killed innocents.' The Aurors used Unforgivables and sometimes 'people were hurt in the crossfire from Ministry actions.'

Harry went back to the archives and found confiscated Death Eater records. He read all of them, too. They were diaries kept by Voldemort's top people. The man had even had an unofficial historian to document his campaigns.

Some of the stories agreed precisely with what the Aurors had stated – well, except for the bureaucratic language employed. But others were vastly different accounts.

The Aurors and the Death Eaters agreed on who'd killed Fabian Prewett, but disagreed on how Gideon had died (Aurors blamed Antonin Dolohov; the Death Eaters credited friendly fire from an unknown Auror). There were inconsistencies like this for almost a decade's worth of records.

Then Harry began to pay attention to the details around the official reports (not the facts inside them): who'd approved the reports, who'd read and authorized them. Quite a few names came back again and again. Crouch, Bagnold, Fudge, and others he wasn't familiar with.

The odd divergence between Death Eater accounts, Ministry accounts, and the printed record in the Daily Prophet occurred most often when Bartemius Crouch was involved and only less often when Fudge inserted himself into the situation.

A pattern like that was problematic, given what Harry knew of both men.

Harry took stacks of notes…and drew many disturbing conclusions about the history he'd never known. The Aurors killed three times as many people as the Death Eaters had at their three dozen different pitched battles (excluding the many, many raids where the Death Eaters were unopposed).

Harry also began counting numbers and names. The Death Eaters had numbered fewer than forty by the time Voldemort was 'vanquished' in 1981, but the reports revealed the names of two hundred nineteen known or suspected Death Eaters killed in battles, a far larger base of support for Voldemort than history ever revealed. At their height, the Aurors had only been one hundred forty bodies strong. History had obscured that fact as well.

Questions and doubts of many kinds filled his mind, but Harry found only more questions and not answers in what he read – in the distractions he filled his life with as he couldn't have his children back. The question, the main one, was 'why?'

Harry turned back to his notes on the proceedings of the Wizengamot during this time.

On the last day of November, Harry finally realized he had enough suspicions.

"How was I so blind? I almost saw the truth in that horrible last year of the war, but I flushed all my anger. I let the dying Snape and the dead Dumbledore manipulate me again…Their half truths got me to forgive them both, the ruddy bastards."

Harry went to Hogwarts over the winter break and got permission from Headmaster Keitch, former Defense Professor and Head of Hufflepuff House, to speak with Albus Dumbledore's portrait in a private setting.

Harry could barely contain his contempt for his former Headmaster. "Albus, I have a few matters to discuss with you…"

"Certainly, Harry, but let me extend my condolences. Freddie Keitch told me what happened…"

Harry waved his hand. "I want to talk about the Wizengamot in the 1970s, Albus. You were the Chief Warlock then as through much of the rest of your life…"

The portrait nodded.

"You didn't force Crouch or anyone else to follow the rules then. You let them get away without giving trials to suspected Death Eaters; you let them essentially execute a number of suspected Death Eaters…"

The portrait tried to interrupt.

"I've read the transcripts from the trials and the complete text of the Wizengamot sessions from then. I know. You allowed the Ministry to pillage the estates of extinct wizarding lines without regard to the wills left behind. You allowed wizarding orphans to be sent to muggle orphanages – which is worse than what you did to me in 1981 – and many of them never came back into our world, at least not into the British portion."

"There was nothing I could do…"

"Albus, you were the most powerful wizard in Britain. There wasn't much you couldn't do. With that kind of power, the rules no longer apply to you, unless you choose to follow them, right? That's the reason they insisted you serve as Chief Warlock? To tie you closer to the rules…"

"Barty Crouch had the public support to prosecute the war…"

"Albus, he was as much a terrorist in the end as Voldemort was. I suspect he covered up the deaths of at least one hundred witches and wizards dying, non-combatants, without any punishment for their attackers…every case was attributed to 'accidental means' or blamed on Death Eaters…"

"Now, Harry, there's no way you could know that."

"I went and found the Death Eaters' record of events. They planned to win, you know, and wanted to be able to write convincing histories of their great triumph over 'the muggle-loving fools.' So, I do know. I compared the Death Eater records with the official Ministry archives; they don't match in a lot of places. I have no idea why you let this happen…"

"There was nothing legal I could do to stop…"

"So you just sat at the head of a public court system and didn't tell anyone? Didn't explain it all to the public?"

"I didn't want to be disloyal…"

"Albus, you sat silently through the killings of hundreds of witches and wizards. And you had an illegal vigilante group keeping tabs in your spare time. I don't think you cared too much about what was legal…but you should have done the right things…"

"What would you have had me do, Harry?"

"End it. Protect the non-combatants."

"It sounds so simple. How?" Albus was almost mocking him now.

"Handle the people causing the chaos and destruction. Get rid of Crouch. Lock up or kill the mad dog Aurors he unleashed on Britain. Get rid of the Death Eaters. Solve the problem."

"Those were Voldemort's methods, Harry…"

"They were also Crouch's, Moody's, and a whole lot of others. The Aurors _killed_ innocents while trying to _capture_ the Death Eaters. Innocent people died needlessly every week from 1973 to 1981."

"I mourned the deaths, Harry…"

"Mourning is never enough, Albus. You had all the knowledge you needed, but you did nothing. Worse than nothing… You killed people yourself."

"What? I did nothing of the sort…"

"My parents died because of a faulty spell you threw at them: there are far better security wards than the Fidelius Charm. And even that one doesn't require an outsider to hold the secret…why insist on Sirius or someone else to hold the Secret? My father could have held it. Hell, even a Potter elf could have been trusted, you bastard…"

The portrait sputtered in indignation.

"I wonder why the Master Legilimencer sitting in front of me never tested his Order members? Or did you actually know about Pettigrew…"

The portrait blanched. "So, you knew or suspected…and, as always, you did nothing with the knowledge. You set it up so that the prophecy could play itself out, so that Voldemort could, with some effort, find me and my parents. You must have been so happy when you heard that the burden for ending Voldemort's days fell onto someone else. The great Dumbledore could keep his hands and beard clean, right?"

The portrait's jaw firmed. "I tried my hardest. The Order and I rescued whom we could. We fought along side the Aurors when we could. But nothing could deal with Voldemort. You could land a spell directly on him and it would do little or nothing… Only the Avada Kedavra, it seemed, would work… And I wouldn't, couldn't –"

"What good are you, Albus, if you never did anything with your vaunted powers? You say now that you did everything possible. Why was the Auror force so small compared to the ranks of the Death Eaters? Why did Voldemort have free reign to recruit in Britain and every other European country? Why did the British never ask for foreign assistance? You were the one everyone looked to for leadership, but you abrogated it to Barty Crouch and his mindless thugs. You, on the other hand, sat around, let criminals run the Ministry, let the old purebloods appear at parties during the day before they donned their masks at night. You knew the names of many of the Death Eaters; you could use your Mind Arts to find the rest, had you wanted. You had the power – and the utter obligation – to stop all of it. You could have had everyone in a private jail cell within days, not the most legal of actions, but it would have left Voldemort alone and more vulnerable. You knew everything that happened in Britain and did nothing. Why? That's why I've come to argue with a dusty piece of canvas. Why? Why did all this happen?"

"I don't know how to answer that…"

"Why did my parents die? Why did you stick me with hateful muggles? Why the little adventures in my first, fourth, and fifth school years that you could have stopped? Why didn't you stop Ginny Weasley from unleashing the basilisk? Or why not insist on Sirius Black receiving a trial? Cornelius Fudge couldn't have cast a cheering charm if he hadn't asked permission first. Why?"

The portrait pursed his lips.

"To think I forgave you all the horrible things you did, even after your history with Grindelwald and your dead sister and everything. You made Snape have me believe I was another sacrifice in your grand plans. I walked off believing I was about to sacrifice my life for everyone else's…and, even for that, I forgave you. Well, no more. Albus Dumbledore, you are declared enemy betrayer of the Potter Family. May peace forever escape you."

"What did you just do, boy?" The portrait Albus had just leaped to his feet, as if he could change anything now that he was trapped in paint.

"Tipping your hand, finally? 'Boy.' You sound like my Uncle Vernon."

"You can't do that to a dead man. It condemns them – me – to…"

"…eternal purgation. It's no less than you deserve. Lies after betrayals after omissions after plots. You are a piece of work, Albus. I hope the cleansing fires where you are find something inside you worth salvaging."

"No, stop, you have to stay your words, Harry. You can't do this to my soul…"

Harry started to get ready to leave, but had a sudden flash of realization. He smiled a deadly smile and fixed his gaze on the portrait.

"I long ago pieced together that you arranged for my ignorance. But one more part just made sense. You arranged for me to meet _that_ woman didn't you? I don't believe the Weasleys, even that vile woman I married, knew what you had planned by ensuring I was clueless my first time at King's Cross Station. But you certainly hoped that I'd fall in with the most prominent of the Light wizarding families, didn't you? To get laughs from the twins, to make Ron my friend, perhaps even to fall for the red headed seventh child of the Weasleys. That's why Hagrid came to speak with me, not a representative of the Ministry of Magic. Everything was always different in my life; exceptions, complications. All your doing, I know now. You, Albus, are partially to blame for me meeting _that_ woman, the Medea of our age. Because I just now realized it, I will never release you from your torments."

The portrait was openly crying now. The bit of soul residue contained inside the portrait was beginning to feel the pain Harry had just called down for Albus Dumbledore's true soul.

"When I see you again, Albus, it will not go well for you."

Harry left the small, dusty classroom where the portrait had been located. He knew enough now to be sure of his course.

"I, Harry Potter, will spend the rest of my life trying to right the wrongs committed by Voldemort, Crouch, Dumbledore, and every other villain who's broken magical Britain."

The golden glow of a solemn vow filled the corridor.

Without too much thought, Harry had just committed himself to an insane plan he had no idea would work.

When he was outside, he walked to the Forbidden Forest…specifically to a small clearing that he knew well. It didn't take him long to recover the small stone, very rare, he needed. When he walked back to the Hogwarts grounds, he stopped near Dumbledore's tomb.

He placed his wand hand on the white stone and said, "Come to me, my true wand." Moments later an enormous crack formed in the tomb and Harry held the Elder Wand once more. He took his holly wand and transfigured the distinctive Deathstick into something much more common: cherry wood.

He gave his new 'cherry' wand a few tests and it worked like a wonder. It was ultimate power in his hand.

Harry Potter left the grounds of Hogwarts never to return in this lifetime.

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_April 17, 2021_

Once Harry recklessly decided on his improbable plan, he spent the next three years preparing. His pique of anger had not diminished in that time. He had not told the Hogwarts Headmaster why the portrait of Albus Dumbledore only moaned in pain now…Harry's anger for all manner of things was without bound.

But inside the anger, Harry's mind was still able to plan, to weight alternatives, and to prepare.

His planning could all be for naught, as his 'plan' seemed more than ideation of a madman than anything bound in reality. Still, Harry gathered together the elements he needed. He gathered together Voldemort's entire playbook from the first war: everything he'd done, everything the Ministry had done in response.

He compiled exacting biographies on everyone known to have played a role on either side of the first Voldemort war. Details of where they lived, how they made their money, who they associated with, what battles they were known to have been involved in, and anything else of interest.

The most important were on Dumbledore, Voldemort, Severus Snape, and Sybil Trelawney – the four people who had turned a mad woman's utterances into a 'reason' to wipe out a young family. He also studied the Malfoys, the Flints, the Crouches, the Fudges, and even the Umbridges.

He had a detailed treatise on Voldemort's horcruxes…where they were, what they were, roughly when they'd been created, and how to get at them. He listed all the known methods of destroying them and a few suspicions on other methods. Harry wanted to ensure that Voldemort's first fall was his last fall.

He had a detailed timeline on the events of the war: the dates of key Wizengamot votes, the dates of key disappearances and battles and raids, the date Trelawney lapsed into her prophecy…all of it. Harry was going to change everything he possibly could. (He had done the same with the Muggle world, as well, to have a second set of references. He even collated details lists of important stock and their high and low price points over the decades. While the information could be helpful supporting Harry's plans in a financial sense, it was also necessary to use such a thing to ensure that he didn't change history too much – just enough.)

He had a list of all his suspicions, all his hypotheses. He would try to prove or disprove them…he would try to set history aright.

He also had three journals filled with notes on the theory of time travel and on the problem of _paradox_. He had even concocted a set of rules to ensure he wouldn't change the timeline he knew too much so as to destroy the advantage he held against Voldemort.

His plan was insane, audacious, likely to be a spectacular failure – but just bizarre enough to _possibly_ work.

Harry was going to send himself back in time…on a one-way mission…to ensure that no one named Harry Potter ever grew up an orphan. He couldn't have children any more – couldn't stand the idea of trying to replace James, Albus, and Lily – or even use his plan to bring them back to life. He would just look at their living bodies and remember what _she_ had done to them. No, the past he was considering was what led up to the scar on his forehead and the graves his parents dwelled in now. Harry couldn't bring himself to journey back to any point in which _she_ had been alive.

He could ensure, however, that his own parents lived and his childhood was normal and undistinguishable from any other.

All it would take was the Elder Wand, the Resurrection Stone, and the Cloak of Invisbility…Harry hoped. No one had ever attempted this sort of thing before, but Harry didn't care. He had nothing in the present. All his mind was focused on the past.

On what might have been.


	2. My Kingdom For A Horcrux

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**Chapter 2: My Kingdom For A … Horcrux**

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_May 9, 2021_

It had taken three weeks of almost constant effort to arrange the last step. Harry had pulled all of his considerable wealth from Gringotts and, through various means, converted it into antique British muggle notes and golden ingots. He packed all of the things he was likely to need on his one-way through time and history.

Harry Potter was preparing to ensure that the phrase, the 'Boy-Who-Lived,' never had reason to exist.

He clutched his shrunken belongings in one hand and stuffed them in his back pocket. Then he apparated to a forest outside Kent. He knew the theory behind what he was about to do, but wanted to ensure he had the best possible opportunity to ensure the correct result.

He arrived in a clearing he'd found a year earlier in a small bit of forest. He pulled out the Cloak of Invisibility and draped it over his shoulders. Then he pulled out the masked Elder Wand and pulled the Resurrection Stone from his pocket.

He closed his eyes, pointed his wand at himself, and said, "Avada Kedavra."

When he opened his eyes, he was back in King's Cross as he had been once before. It was utterly deserted. There was no revolting Voldemort baby this time, thankfully. A man stepped from the shadows and walked toward Harry. It wasn't Dumbledore…it was someone Harry only recognized from engravings and pictures in books.

"Mr. Flamel?"

"Mr. Potter. Why have you come this time?"

Harry just smiled. His plan was working so far. "I'm not surprised a man so concerned with his own mortality would be the keeper of this place in Albus' _unfortunate_ absence."

The ancient Flamel frowned. "Tell me if you know what's happened to my friend… No one can figure out how he began screaming in pain decades after his death. Purgatory sets in immediately to burn away one's sins or it never takes hold…"

Harry just nodded.

"You won't say? Answer the question of why you're here, at least… The Master of Death should only use his power in extreme need, not just on a lark, Mr. Potter."

"The need was extreme. I aim to fix problems that Albus, you, and other powerful people couldn't be bothered to solve. I know that no man made time turner or other spell or artifact will provide me with the one remaining thing I need…"

The old, dead wizard just gasped indignantly.

"I'm not here to go back or to move forward. Or to visit on a lark…or to discuss that miserable excuse for a wizard, the one you still call 'friend'. I'm here to walk through time itself. I've had a lot of time to consider this…along with the half truths Albus insisted on feeding to me." Harry just smiled. "I am Master of Death. This place is connected to all worlds, all times, and all possible outcomes. I order a portal to June 12, 1976 to take me to the exact physical location I just left."

"No. You mustn't do that," Flamel tried to argue.

A huge groaning echo sounded through the station. Harry didn't appear nervous when the walls began to shake or when the ground underneath the unused rails buckled. Finally a massive tearing sound echoed through the room.

"Harry, what have you done?"

The determined man just stared at the ancient alchemist. "I'm setting things right again."

A massive swirl of blackness, like a tear of canvas on which a movie was shown, appeared in front of Harry Potter. Without a second thought, Harry stepped through it.

He opened his eyes again…back in the forest. It was a different place, though. The air smelled a bit dirtier and the road noise nearby was much subdued. Was it coal dust in the air? Or the lead from the gasoline of the day?

He quickly searched himself to ensure all his belongings had made the trip with him. He still had his powerful wand, his cloak, and his stone. He had his portable vault filled with gold and muggle identity papers and 'antique' hundred pound notes. He had three shrunken trunks filled with the books, potions, and other items he would need for his quest.

Harry disapparated. He had only months to find and destroy the horcruxes, to establish his muggle identity, and to be prepared to save the lives of his grandparents.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_June 28, 1976_

Harry swore loudly. He'd half known that the cavern filled with inferi wouldn't exist yet – as Regulus Black was still in his fourth or maybe fifth year at Hogwarts and wouldn't have joined the Death Eaters yet – but seeing the proof with his eyes left Harry Potter angry.

The horcrux hunt had gone very well until this major stumbling point.

The Peverell ring at the Gaunt shack had already been broken and the horcrux dispelled. Harry figured his arrival as the Master of the three Hallows had been enough to overwhelm the evil object. To avoid a paradox, the stone Voldemort had used as a horcrux had simply ceased to exist. Harry did wonder what had happened to Dumbledore's copy of the Elder Wand and the Potter Cloak of Invisibility. Perhaps all three Hallows had disappeared from their original owners.

The Ravenclaw artifact had been the easiest to actually capture. He had arranged a simple decoy – a massive explosion in the Forbidden Forest – while Harry snuck into the castle. The teachers had flown from the school to the Forest suspecting some kind of Death Eater attack. Harry used his Cloak and made it to and from the Room of Requirement in less than ninety minutes. Most of the time had been spent searching the rubbish filled room.

The diary held by the Malfoys had been trickier. Harry had had to kill Abraxus Malfoy and burn the Manor down to cover the theft. Given his own brief experience in the dungeons of the Manor, Harry hadn't minded destroying the place. Surprisingly, for as foul as Abraxas had been, he was even a weaker duelist than Lucius would be in adulthood.

The Hufflepuff cup had been kept not by the Lestranges or in the Lestrange Gringotts vault, but rather by Orion Black, Sirius' father and Voldemort's then right hand. As Harry knew Number 12 Grimmauld Place all too well, it had been easy to leave a duplicate cup in its place. It had been odd walking into the home that didn't possess a screaming portrait of Walburga Black – as she was still among the living.

But where would Voldemort have left the blasted locket?

He decided to check this stupid cavern again. He was standing inside the small antechamber Harry remembered all too well. Harry pulled a small silver dagger and cut his palm. He flicked blood on every surface of that horrifying niche. Nothing registered; no magical door opened.

Voldemort had Slytherin's locket somewhere else.

This was a complication Harry had expected…but still didn't know how to overcome. It was either with a Death Eater, on Voldemort's person (as he was known to move continuously to avoid attack), or in a less secure, but still hidden, location.

Harry needed to revise his plan.

He had to save lives, prevent the timeline from shifting beyond recognition, and find that final horcrux. Harry didn't want to think of what kind of chaos would occur if Voldemort lost his body at this point? Would the evil wraith attempt the same means of resurrection – at the same time, using the same victims? Or would he try different, unpredictable things?

Harry wasn't about to find out.

He wanted a nice, clean, final ending for Voldemort.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_August 3, 1976_

Harry Potter walked into a dingy office.

"We're only buying," the receptionist said in an annoyed voice. "We don't sell anything to the public here."

"Good thing. I'm selling, not buying."

"Sorry. We get a lot of curious people dropping by asking inane question. 'Do you have gold rings?' We're not that kind of gold dealer… Do you have a license?"

Harry nodded. He lifted his briefcase to the counter. Once opened the receptionist saw that the man had brought along four ingots as well.

"Samples?"

Harry nodded and handed the woman his documentation.

She read the papers, picked up a phone, and then nodded to Harry. "If you'll take a seat, Mr. Franklin, one of our buyers will be out for you."

Harry just nodded again and took a seat.

In this world, Harry Potter didn't exist. Thomas Franklin, however, did own a small flat in Manchester and it was filled with many odd and wonderful things. Mr. Franklin also possessed quite a few very well endowed bank accounts throughout Britain and Ireland. He had registered as a trader in precious metals and stones. He maintained a small office in a dingy office building near the banking sector. He attended estate auctions and did other public business to show where he was acquiring some of the gold he had a license to smelt.

It wasn't much of a cover, but it served.

It also permitted Harry to convert his gold bullion from the future into pounds for his present needs. Harry needed enough money to ensure he survived long enough to watch over his yet-to-be-born-self, to make sure the infant Harry grew up with a happy childhood. Harry wanted to watch himself graduate from Hogwarts and get married and have children. He needed enough cash to survive for twenty years or longer in the muggle world.

Harry had made the hard choice to hide from the wizarding world…to not know his grandparents, his parents, the witches and wizards he remembered. He could see them but not speak to them…not get to have relationships with them or learn their histories from their own mouths.

It was the choice he'd made.

He reached out to pluck a stale looking Economist from the coffee table when he heard his name called. Harry looked up, smiled, and walked over to the burly man who'd come to speak with him.

Harry followed the man back into his grimy burrow of offices and took a seat. He opened his briefcase and put the four ingots onto the desk. The burly man lit up in interest.

"How many like this?"

"Right now, I have perhaps two hundred troy ounces available." In reality, Harry had many, many thousands of ounces, but the current price of gold was nothing compared to what it would be in a few short years. He would sell little bits when gold was cheap and wait for the greener days ahead.

The burly man smiled. "If this tests pure, I think we can do business."

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_October 31, 1976_

The Code of Harry was the name for the set of rules Harry Potter had decided upon to ensure 1) he didn't get too caught up in vengeance for the life he had led and 2) he didn't change too much in this timeline and negate all the foreknowledge he had. Among other things, the Code stipulated that:

--Everyone would be given one chance to make a mistake and repent, rather than Dumbledore's apparent policy of unlimited chances. A Death Eater caught in a raid would be stunned if possible, but only the first time. If he attacked again in a future raid, Harry wouldn't hesitate to kill him. The same for politicians: each one could be forgiven a single piece of bigoted or incendiary legislation, but not a second.

--People who were supposed to have died in raids, according to the original timeline, would be taken to safe houses until Voldemort was well and truly dead. It would be to the world as if they had died, which should help to ensure that the timeline didn't vary much past what Harry already knew. Wouldn't do to have Voldemort making three separate raids on the same target and throwing off the planning from what he'd done the first time around: how would Harry cope with that? When Voldemort's time had passed, Harry would unveil the rescued victims to the world. Harry had already placed three targeted families into hiding.

--No witch or wizard was to ever see his face or hear his name. Obliviation was his preferred technique for masking himself from the people he'd rescued.

--Harry wouldn't deal with the Ministry or Dumbledore in any major way until after he'd dealt with Voldemort and his horcruxes. No change of any importance could happen until Voldemort and the worst of his pureblood supporters were out of the picture.

These elements of Harry's moral code, designed to keep his time travel secret and his foreknowledge of Voldemort's plans safe, caused him to pause for a moment as he saw an unconscious Lucius Malfoy stunned on the floor of the Manor he was raiding. His first intention was to just kill Lucius and be done with it.

However, the tickling of morality caused him to rethink his plan. The young family Head had probably just graduated from Hogwarts…and seemed to be clear of the Dark Mark…but Harry was too strongly influenced by his remembrances of the corrupting man.

The man had used a horcrux to unleash a basilisk. He'd participated in a raid on the Ministry of Magic that had gotten his godfather killed. He'd gone back to his old bribery tricks a few years after the war…which was the reason Kingsley Shacklebolt had finally been made Minister. The man would grow up corrupted and vile…

But that had been the old Lucius.

Perhaps some investigation was required. Harry transfigured the stunned Malfoy into a ferret (ah, a good Hogwarts memory) and slipped the beast into his pocket.

Harry moved through the rest of Flint Manor searching for the blasted Slytherin locket. He didn't have all that long left to destroy Voldemort and save his grandparents' lives. The idea of compromising on the two goals – saving his grandparents, while letting Voldemort continue his reign of terror until Harry finally had the Slytherin locket – hadn't yet coalesced in Harry's mind.

Harry found nothing of the locket at Flint Manor, but he did discover the remains of three women in the dungeons. Witches, muggles or hags, Harry would never know.

When he walked out of the small, dark manor, he set it on fire. He was only upset that he'd drug all the Flints outside beforehand. He had to give them the benefit of the doubt.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_November 1, 1976_

The interrogation of Lucius Malfoy began before sunrise the next morning. The man had been in his ferret form since he was captured to ensure he couldn't cause trouble. Harry reversed the transfiguration to reveal the human side of Malfoy.

Harry waited for a few minutes until Lucius blearily began to question where he was. Even half dazed, he sounded haughty.

"We'll start with the rules, Lucius. Lie to me once and I cut off your hand. Lie to me twice and you'll never leave this room alive…"

"The Dark Lord will kill you…"

"Be careful, Lucius. That could be considered a lie."

The young blonde just sneered at Harry. "I don't have to answer any questions…this isn't a courtroom, you peon."

Harry just smiled. "You will answer."

"I'm a Slytherin. I'll never break."

"You're the weakest sort of Slytherin. You'd claim 'I was under enchantment' when caught, rather than owning up to the ideals of your Dark Lord."

"I'd never betray the cause that way," Lucius said. It only made Harry smiled. Lucius didn't know himself at all, did he?

"I think you lie."

"I'd never deny the Dark Lord, not even under torture."

Harry smiled, but Lucius couldn't see past the hood over Harry's face. "Interesting you should say that. I haven't had any good practice in that art for some time now. Would you prefer questions – or the other method?"

The blonde man shut his face. His values extended only so far, it seemed. Lucius really was the worst kind of Slytherin.

"Have you joined the Dark Lord?"

Lucius nodded. Harry wondered about getting ahold of some truth serum. This whole interrogation hadn't exactly been planned…and Harry was regretting his lack of planning on this topic.

"You're not Marked."

"I haven't completed my first mission…you, whoever you are, prevented that."

"Did you do this before or after your father died?"

"After."

"You sought out the Dark Lord then?"

"No, he sent emissaries after me."

"You went willingly to meet him?"

"Yes, of course. My father had told me for years about my duty." Harry had heard similar words come from the mouth of Draco Malfoy several times.

"What have you done for the Dark Lord thus far?"

"Intelligence from the Ministry…"

Harry had always wondered about the things Lucius had done. Bagnold had had Lucius' trial records seals and later destroyed in the original timeline. Harry more than suspected that the Minister had been bribed to ensure that sort of accommodation.

"Do you remain in his service of your own free will?"

"I don't…yes. Yes, I do."

Doubt. Indecision. It was just a moment of weakness, was that enough? Was this Lucius Malfoy, free of his father's influence, capable of reformation? Albus Dumbledore would have said 'yes' no matter what the evidence.

"The Dark Lord will fall within the year, Lucius. It's been prophesied. What will you do with this knowledge?"

Lucius sneered. "He said that he is immortal. How could he fall?"

"He's used horcruxes, Lucius, little soul receptacles that can be found and destroyed. He's only 'immortal' until they're all gone…"

The sneering Malfoy had changed into a terrified one. "No, you lie. No one can remain sane after creating a horcrux. It's a fundamental part of Dark Arts theory, every gain using Dark magic comes with a steep cost, the greater the gain the greater magnitude of the cost…"

"You think Voldemort cares about sanity? He loves only power…"

"I refuse to – "

Harry didn't wait for the man to finish his thought. Lucius would not change. "Obliviate," Harry almost whispered.

What to do? Kill him – no, the Code of Harry demanded that Lucius be given one additional chance to choose differently. Let him free – no, Harry wouldn't make it easy on him.

Give Lucius a little taste of the dangers of his path? That was interesting. Harry would give Lucius Malfoy a sharp kick in the head to help him see differently. If Harry staged this correctly, he could test Lucius and begin testing the Ministry of Magic at the same time. What happened with Lucius would testify to his nature and also to the sorts of corruption within the Ministry. A useful experiment, Harry decided.

Harry hit the dazed man with a stunner, a half dozen light cutting curses, and a befouling curse. Lucius looked like he'd been in a battle of some sort and come out the worse for it. Harry clutched the man's shoulder and disapparated with him. They arrived at the very edge of Knockturn Alley just before daybreak. Harry pushed the Head of the Malfoy family into the dark ruins of an abandoned shop.

He'd be stripped of his valuables and wand by eight o'clock and Aurors would likely discover him by noon. Perhaps he'd have a good story to tell…perhaps not.

Lucius Malfoy had his first chance…his only chance…according to the Code of Harry. Merlin help him.

The Ministry of Magic would be judged by what it did with this man. Harry had no childish notions they'd perform admirably.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_December 12, 1976_

Harry was single-handedly doing a massive amount of damage to the Death Eater support structure. He was also nervous that his work might be altering the timeline, rendering all his knowledge from the future useless. He kept a careful watch to ensure that, Harry's actions aside, things stayed the same.

For the most part, they did. Little details seemed to shift, but the raids still occurred on their appointed days and times.

Harry Potter could only hope that the raid scheduled for today happened exactly on schedule. He had failed to locate the Slytherin locket, so Harry now had to rescue his grandparents from their planned deaths. (Harry had been told, as a young man, that they'd died of natural causes…but it was yet another of Dumbledore's fabrications. The man was an inveterate liar, like he couldn't stop the falsehoods pouring out of his own mouth.)

The good news: Harry's grandparents would live. The bad news: Unable to find the final horcrux, Harry had to let Voldemort live for another day.

Harry took up position just outside the ward line. As a true Potter, he could have passed through the wards protecting Potter Manor without a problem, save for the notification that would have been sent to his grandfather. For this to work, no one could know of Harry's presence.

It wasn't long until Harry felt the battering against the wards. He saw his grandfather leave the manor, after telling his grandmother to flee. She didn't listen to him, of course.

They both began setting up defenses outside the manor. They both seemed to know some rather gruesome timed transfigurations. Rocks turning into piles of explosive powder; logs transforming into columns of spikes; hedgerows that captured anyone stepping near them; small statues and benches that would explode on command, sending hundreds of deadly stone shards flying. Harry was honestly impressed.

He'd done well enough on his NEWTs but couldn't perform anything like the post-Master-level spells he was seeing now. Sadly, though, Harry knew it hadn't been enough to save them the first time around. Two people with dozens of tricks couldn't withstand a massive, determined raiding party.

Harry would have to add the extra bit now. His grandparents had taken up defensive positions hundreds of yards from where the Death Eaters would be coming.

The wards began to ripple. Harry waited patiently. Thirty seconds later they rippled again and then fell.

Green light flashed in the distance. Harry took off at a run. He sent banishers at four Death Eaters – sending them into the traps prepared by the Potters – before anyone could even notice there was an extra combatant. He sent another one at a pile of explosive powder and watched as the man disintegrated from the blast and three of his comrades were knocked off their feet from the concussion.

He recognized a few people who'd felt his mercy before. Harry used cutting curses on Curia Flint, one of the rare female Death Eaters, and Gaius Carrow. Neither would ever get up again.

Harry pivoted when he saw a still-masked Death Eater take aim at his grandmother. A powerful banisher sent the fool into one of the hedgerows. The man was bound by the plants before a massive stalk of a vine punctured the man's throat. Harry was even more impressed by the viciousness of these traps.

People should be on notice not to mess with the Potters…perhaps that was why Voldemort sent such a large raiding party.

Harry surveyed the field. His grandparents were injured, but alive. They had managed to stun four attackers…which was good for Harry's evolving plan. The disillusioned, trained warrior sent a pair of stunners at his grandparents. Neither had expected the spells and they both collapsed.

Harry moved his grandparents off the field of battle. Then he took his first steps ever into the Potter Manor. He flicked his wand in every room he visited, setting the heirlooms to pack up into satchels he conjured. He spent five minutes ensuring all the books in the vast library got packed up. The portraits were indignant about being moved and shrunk. It didn't matter.

Harry was inside a total of thirty minutes and hadn't run across a single house elf. He hoped the Potters either kept none or that the creatures would be smart enough to desert a burning building.

He walked back outside with seven bulging, magically expanded satchels. Then he picked up the wands from three Death Eaters and cast strong fire spells at the Manor. For this to be convincing, the Manor had to burn. The Potters had to _seem_ to be dead, destroyed in the flames.

He looked across the field and ruined gardens once more. The Manor was rapidly falling apart, but the residents would be safe… He used one of the Death Eater wands to conjure the Dark Mark in the inky black sky.

Harry apparated his rescue victims and their belongings to a safe house he'd warded. He'd constructed a number of modest homes on land he'd purchased weeks after arriving back in history.

Harry laid his grandmother on a bed and then tended to his grandfather.

He sat down and wrote them a brief explanation (which was the story he wanted them to know, rather than the true facts of what had happened):

_Mr. and Mrs. Potter,_

_I rescued you from a Death Eater attack earlier this evening. Unfortunately I was unable to prevent them from burning your Manor. The bags contain what belongings I was able to rescue for you. Given the obvious interest that the Death Eaters have in you, I hope you'd be willing to remain here out of the public view. After the Ministry finally deals with Voldemort, you should be safe to reappear in public life._

_Perhaps you'd like to send your son a note so he knows that you are safe and protected? Please use a secrecy charm on the parchment to ensure he keeps the information to himself._

_I will ensure a house elf delivers fresh food for you. Please let Kepler know if you have any favorite foods or if there is anything else you need._

_Stay safe._

It was the best gift he could give his grandparents: enough life to see their grandson come into the world.

He looked at them again and sighed. Dumbledore had even lied about them, said they'd died of old age or some rot – when the official reports showed that the Potter Manor had been destroyed along with Harris Frederick Potter and Eloise Crockford Potter. Dumbledore and his lies…not this time.

The world would be fixed one action at a time, one saved life at a time, one lie not needed at a time.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_February 12, 1977_

Harry Potter had set up his most unusual glamour yet for the current day's 'work.' Harry looked twenty years older than he was. His hair was short, spiky, and dirty gray. His face was deeply lined with wrinkles and his hands were covered in foul-looking liver spots.

He looked like a wacky old wizard in brown and yellow robes as he hobbled around Hogsmeade. Looking as bizarre as he did, no one in town gave him a second glance. He walked slowly through town looking at all the shops and stopping in to visit several of them. He purchased a bit of chocolate, twenty grams of graphorn bile, and a book on the history of pygmies.

He had his eye on a couple of the unusual denizens of Hogsmeade on this day: James Potter and Sirius Black. It was a 'Hogsmeade weekend' for the students of Hogwarts and Harry wanted to keep an eye on things.

History hadn't recorded any attacks this day at this venue, but Harry was a cautious sort. He also wanted to get his first glimpse of his living father…and perhaps even his living mother.

Harry didn't like to lie to himself, but he did this day. He was here to protect Hogsmeade from a non-existent attack and _also_ to meet his parents in their younger selves.

He wandered finally into The Three Broomsticks and saw a very young Madam Rosmerta tending the bar. She was quite a hit with the male patrons she served that day.

He picked a table in the middle of the room, near to where James and Sirius and Remus were holed up in a booth plotting something. The traitor Pettigrew was nowhere to be seen.

Harry slowly sipped on his firewhiskey and then ordered the house special. Bar food was a rare indulgence but he needed a bit of cover to explain his lingering at the table.

While he sipped and waited for his meal, Harry listened.

"…Peter knows the best way to get into the Slytherin dungeons. Boy's a genius at lurking around, you know," James said.

"I think we should get him to appear in the Slytherin girls dorms as a rat and see how many of them scream," Sirius said.

Remus chuckled for a moment before his face went serene.

"Nah, what's the fun in that if only Slytherins hear each other screaming," James said, a bit dreamily. "Now if they started screaming for no good reason in the Great Hall…"

"Screaming powder," Sirius said. "Yes, I think we could do some wonderful things with a powder or a potion that just made people scream…"

Remus was back to laughing. "Don't worry about me, I left the prefect badge back in the Tower."

James smirked. "Ah, yes, Revolting Righteous Remus… How many rules have you broken this year?"

Sirius laughed. "All of them?"

Remus smiled, but seemed to consider the question seriously. "Well, I'd have to say that I haven't broken every one. I can't remember ever hurling a portrait off the staircases…or changing McGonagall into a man…or setting a troll loose in the dungeons…"

Harry almost choked on his firewhiskey when he heard that last idea. Had Quirrell stolen the idea of the troll from the prefect's rulebook? Harry had never read the ridiculous thing.

Sirius just laugh, however. "Excellent ideas, Remus. Perhaps we should all study the rule book to make sure we break all of them before we graduate…"

"I can see McGonagall as a man," James said, "but I've no idea where to get a troll."

Remus twisted his head. "I think I have a candidate for a portrait to throw off a staircase, rather pesky fellow who thinks he's brave. Tries to challenge me to a jousting contest every time I wander past him…"

_Sir Cadogan_, Harry murmured to himself. Things didn't change much at Hogwarts, did they?

Harry suddenly found his table filled with food. He looked up and gruffly thanked Rosmerta. Then he tried to figure out what he'd ordered. It certainly smelled pungent. So much so that it drove off James, Sirius, and Remus about five minutes later.

He choked down as much of the revolting fish dish as he could before he paid his tab and left.

He'd felt happy for fifteen minutes in that bar, just listening to people he could never formally meet. So close; so far away.

He stayed close to Hogsmeade, revisiting somewhat familiar places and faces, until the last of the Hogwarts students returned to the castle.

It had been his best day of 'work' ever. He hadn't caught sight of his mother nor had he heard much about Dumbledore…the old plotter. Most people here in Hogsmeade thought very well of Dumbledore, save for his brother…

He smiled at the remembrance.

Harry then decided he hadn't finished his work yet. He wandered off toward the Hog's Head for a little visit with the barkeep there.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_March 28, 1977_

The things one could find while maintaining one's cover identity were quite astounding. Harry had ventured off to the estate auction of an old, ramshackle manor house in Kent. He was ostensibly looking for gold to purchase…but he kept his eye out for anything else of interest.

He'd quickly scouted out the gold on display. Several pieces of jewelry were worth far more than the mere gold in their settings; Harry wouldn't bother with these. But there were twelve-karat gold place settings and cutlery. These he might purchase for a reasonable fee.

He kept walking until he came across a table of books and oddities. The books were all grouped together in boxes to be sold in lots. Harry gave them a quick glance and then he saw something odd. A few of the spines in one box 'flickered' a bit. Harry stopped and inquired further. The spines flickered again: one minute they were old boring pre-Victorian novels and the next they were spell books of some sort.

Harry took note of the lot number. Then he perused the other boxes for more 'interesting' books. The damned things were spread out in at least seven lots. It had suddenly turned into a long, very interesting day. The only problem? He had _work_ to do tonight. The gold would be up for auction hours before the books. Harry decided to find an interesting way to kill the time.

He bid on the first eight lots, all of which had some gold or silver, and won five of them for reasonable prices.

Then he left the auction area to further investigate the house. He didn't make it far before someone tapped him on the shoulder.

"Lost, sir?"

"No, I'm not. Just curious about this old house."

"I'm Bill Compson, caretaker of the estate. I think the heirs are going to put it up for sale after they clean it up. Interested?"

Harry tipped his head. "Perhaps." He shrugged his partial interest. "When was it built?"

"No one's really sure. The White family has owned it for at least three hundred years. Always had a bit of a strange image in the village down the road. Children always disappeared from the local school at around age ten or so. You'd see 'em during the summers, but none of 'em ever turned up at Eton or the major public schools. Strange lot."

All that he was hearing suggested the family had been magical at one time. Had the line turned to squibs? He tried to think of the name White from what he knew of the great wizarding lines. White. He'd have to pull open some of the books he'd brought back with him, books that were locked in 'Thomas Franklin's' flat.

"Could you give me a brief tour inside? I have a few hours until the next lots I'm bidding for will be up…"

The caretaker shrugged. "Don't see why not."

The day was overcast and a bit gray so the young caretaker – "my pa was hired by old Miss Brundel White herself, you know, and I stepped in when my pa went to the hospital for his heart, what twenty years ago" – used a electrical torch inside. To Harry, the building seemed quite decrepit inside.

"Yes…I can see where this needs some work before attempting to find a buyer."

The caretaker grimly nodded. "I was only allowed to help out with the grounds, you see. The inside was never supposed to be touched. Miss Brundel's standing orders, even after she died and left everything to poor Miss Violet."

Harry looked confused. "People do get the strangest ideas."

"Rich people can afford strange ideas," the caretaker muttered before leading Harry through the rest of the room.

Harry walked slowly and concentrated on his environment. It was a magical house – or had been in the past. The influence of magic had waned considerably, leaving the house its rather tatty appearance (like the Black Mansion the first time Harry had entered it). But Harry saw a few things inside that made him want to return for a further inspection.

For one, he swore there was a hidden passageway or two on just the first floor.

Harry thanked Bill Compson for the tour.

"Still interested?" Mr. Compson was apparently trying to ensure he had a job after the estate was sold.

"I can see the potential of a place like this as a bed-and-breakfast. I hear they're becoming quite popular in this part of the country nowadays."

The old caretaker just nodded. "That'd be something."

Harry smiled, thanked the man again, and went out to bid on the book lots. He was already planning a return visit in the dead of night.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_May 3, 1977_

Harry Potter sighed. He wanted to be back at his tiny flat reading the odd books he'd managed to purchase earlier today. However, he needed information and he couldn't exactly walk into the Ministry of Magic and watch over supposedly secret Wizengamot proceedings. But he could find Aurors, janitors, gossipy secretaries, and such and read the results of trials out of their minds. It would be quite some time before the 'secret Death Eater trial' records became available to the public.

So far, the record wasn't good.

Five dirt-poor individuals found with the Dark Mark hadn't received any official trial before the Wizengamot. They had just been given cells in Azkaban.

Three wealthier purebloods had been tried before the Wizengamot as each of them had a relation of some sort serving on the body. Each of them had been convicted, but had 'escaped' before reaching Azkaban.

Lucius Malfoy had not been tried _and_ not been sent to Azkaban. He had walked out of the Atrium and flooed to the place he was staying while Malfoy Manor was rebuilt according to the original plans. Apparently the raft of blackmail material Abraxus Malfoy had compiled before his death still held sway inside the Ministry, even if it was Lucius wielding the power now.

Eighteen others had 'escaped' before being tried at all.

The corruption in practice was even worse than what the records had indicated. No one had ever recorded the number of escapes from the Ministry. The Aurors all checked each other for the Dark Mark – an Auror-only tradition that the rest of the Ministry shunned – but they were inclined to love violence against Death Eaters. It was the rest of the people refusing to check and verify that made the Ministry a revolving door for captured Death Eaters. A few unimportant ones got sent to Azkaban without trial; the rest 'escaped'.

Thus, Harry had two massive problems inside the Ministry: the vicious, cruel Crouch and his Aurors and all the Voldemort supporters who kept the wider world unsafe with their acts of sabotage. He hadn't even begun to delve into the laws the morons were passing in the Wizengamot. Harry had to staunch the defeat now.

He decided to break his Code of Harry just a little bit. He couldn't just focus on Voldemort to the exclusion of the problems inside the Ministry. He wouldn't permanently incapacitate any Aurors, but he needed more information.

This night was his first 'raid' on the Aurors. He'd selected one whose tactics seemed particularly brutal in the field. Harry made his way through the weak wards established by Miles Tavinish and began to search the man's papers…

Harry was wearing his Cloak of Invisibility and, fifteen minutes after he arrived, was glad he'd been so cautious.

Miles Tavinish returned to his home rather drunk. He stumbled into his study and began discarding his equipment through the room. Then Harry watched as the man walked over to a magical portrait and stuck his hand right through the frame. The image of a dour woman vanished and a set of shelves filled with bundles of parchment and log books appeared.

Harry wordlessly sent a 'Petrificus Totalus' at the Auror. The man froze in place, his hand still extended through the portrait.

Harry took only fifteen minutes to duplicate everything inside the small hidden space. When he moved the petrified Auror, the portrait returned and the space was sealed off again. Rather ingenious use of magic, Harry though, although it was too easily countered.

Harry laid the stout Auror onto the floor of his study. The man's eye lids were frozen open so it took him no effort to cast the Legilimens curse against the man.

Knowledge flowed into Harry's mind. The Auror remembered killing a Death Eater in combat and then ended up blaming it on another, also dead, Death Eater. The Auror remembered a battle where the entire set of muggles being attacked by the Death Eaters had been killed by 'accidental' fire from the Aurors. The memories went on and on. Harry wondered how the man lived with himself.

Harry didn't mind killing combatants in the war…but he was careful to avoid hitting unintended targets. The Aurors didn't care. They just covered up their atrocities afterwards.

Harry screwed up his face and tried again with his source of information. He wanted to know who specifically had been sent to Azkaban without trial. The names were there inside his head, although Harry didn't recognize any of them. He wanted to know which purebloods had 'accidentally' escaped. Most of the names were somewhat familiar, but three stuck out: Barton Scrimgeour (brother of one of the Aurors, a man Harry came to know and loathe), Hierophant Umbridge, and Talmadge Lockhart.

Then Harry took another perusal inside the man's mind. He was curious to see if the Aurors had investigated Voldemort and his unnatural magical abilities. Harry watched then as Tavinish read documents seized in various raids, as he interrogated suspected Death Eaters about Voldemort, as he read over the manifest of items seized from one home… _Stop!_ He forced the memory to replay.

Harry froze the man's mind so he too could read the manifest.

_Raid Report, January 6, 1977_

_Avery Island, Bailiwick of Guernsey_

_Four suspected Death Eaters or sympathizers arrested without injury: Malicus Avery, Tobin Flint, Igor Karkaroff, and Eustace Blaugrund._

_Thirty-seven banned books recovered and burned, including copies of _The Macrola_ and _Bloode Rituals Ad Extensis

_Eighteen dark relics recovered, including an enchanted bottle containing a preserved unicorn foal, a freshly woven Shroud of Death, an enchanted locket with a snake in the shape of an 'S' that cannot be opened…_

That was it. Harry tore through the man's memory to see what had happened to the locket. It obviously hadn't been destroyed, as Voldemort would take Regulus Black's house elf to help hide it in a few years. The Ministry…the Ministry still had the horcrux.

Harry thought back to that awful day when he, Ron, and Hermione had deceived their way into the Ministry to retrieve the Slytherin locket from Dolores Umbridge. It seemed he'd have to do the same thing in this earlier timeline.

But where was it? Harry rifled through the man's mind looking for the truth. Nothing. It was the first clue he'd had in years…and this man knew only enough to whet Harry's interest.

Harry pulled out a small vial he'd begun carrying with him for impromptu interrogations such as this. It looked like water, but it provided only the truth. Harry tipped three drops into the man's mouth and then woke him up.

"How many Death Eaters have you killed," Harry asked. The man's official, reported count was three. His off the book record was far higher.

"Nineteen," the man said in a flat tone. The drug was working.

"What does the Ministry do with dark relics recovered from raids?"

"Most are destroyed. Some are diverted to the Department of Mysteries for further study."

Harry closed his eyes and tried not to scream. He had entirely too many awful memories of the place.

"Have you ever been inside the Department of Mysteries?"

"No."

"Anyone you know ever been inside it?"

"I think my boss, Master Auror Janus Wilmot, consults for them. He's never said it outright, though."

Harry nodded. He had another destination now, in addition to the raids he would foil and divert in the next few weeks and months.

"Who did the Ministry suspect of freeing all these Death Eater prisoners?"

"Mister Crouch has a team investigating it, but they never seem to make any headway. Most people think the higher ups are blocking them…"

"What names have you heard?"

"Callus Umbridge, the former Chief Warlock on the Wizengamot, comes up a lot. Abraxus Malfoy did, too, before his death. Under-secretary Bagnold has amassed a lot of power, as well, but no one knows how. There's also rumors that Cornelius Fudge, in Magical Catastrophes, is covering up something. There's also a rumor that the Unspeakables are keeping information, but there's always rumors about them."

Harry nodded.

"Have you ever killed an innocent person?"

The man looked conflicted.

"Accidentally or not?"

"Yes."

"Did you ever report it?"

"Yes."

"Why do these deaths never appear in the reports?"

"I write them down in the reports I submit. By the time the report is approved, the names and deaths are gone or reattributed."

"Have you ever lied in a report?"

"Yes."

"About what?"

"About the spells I used, about the valuable collected…"

Harry wondered for a moment, before he asked, "Did you ever liberate some items and not report them?"

"Yes."

"Who do you suspect of changing your reports after you submit them?"

"My boss or Mr. Crouch or other team leaders. I don't know, it could be anyone."

Harry really did dislike incurious people. "Have you ever reported your suspicions?"

"Of course not."

"Why not?"

"I like my job. Bad things happen to people who speak their minds."

Harry asked questions on every other topic he could think of before he obliviated the Auror of the last hour of his life.

Harry left the small home and spent a few hours reviewing the documents he'd copied from the man's safe. The Auror was a bit paranoid: he kept copies of all his original reports and also the reports as they finally appeared to the Ministry. The changes were dramatic…but Harry couldn't identify the person who'd done this sort of modification just based off the Auror's evidence.

He had more people to put on his list to question. The deeper he dug in this timeline the more disturbing things Harry discovered.

--The Ministry had held custody over one of Voldemort's horcruxes and did not destroy it.

--There were layers of liars inside the Ministry. Some were lying about what the Aurors did; others about what the Death Eaters did. Each side was trying to sabotage the other from inside the Ministry. No one was trying to clear out the spies and operatives.

--People were just as big of sheep now as they would be when Harry had first entered the wizarding world. It was enough to remind Harry he wasn't doing all this for others; he was doing it for the little wizard who would be born in three years in Godric's Hallow.


	3. Tactics to Win

**Chapter 3: Tactics to Win**

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_May 17, 1977_

Harry apparated back to the House of White. He had just found the time to return for a thorough search. The idea had captured his imagination some time ago and hadn't let up.

The structure looked vastly different in the dark. It wasn't as cruel and insane as Sirius Black's family home had been, but it was close.

He walked to where he'd felt the presence of secret passageways. One opened just from Harry stepping through it. The room contained a number of tea cozies sized for house elves and a few small beds. A second passage didn't want to open, but Harry had learned cursebreaking from some of the best years earlier. He brought down the wards preventing his access.

The room behind the wards was quite something…quite disturbing. It was a divination suite, much like the bizarre tower Trelawney had cloistered herself inside at Hogwarts. But this one had prophecy spheres inside it, too.

They were obviously very old. Harry reached out and plucked one off the shelf. Instead of breaking or refusing his touch, the sphere came willingly. He tapped the thing with his wand.

An ethereal image filled the sphere. Since he was able to view the prophecy, it either pertained to Harry or it was already complete and could be viewed by anyone.

_The forces of Light falter and cower,_

_Hiding behind their shields,_

_None willing to send the first bolt or last._

_Fate decides differently, as the old crumble away._

_The new one comes from a distant land,_

_Black hair turned white before its time, eyes gray,_

_A vicious tongue will lead them to victory._

Harry found the prophecy interesting, especially as it wasn't about him. Still, it made Harry wonder if Dumbledore had stalled in dealing with Tom Riddle for so long that fate had moved on and tried to disregard the old wizard.

Harry plucked another half dozen prophecies off their shelves and listened to them. It was almost soothing.

He wondered, for a moment, what would happen with Trelawney if Harry had gotten the last horcrux before it was time for her prophecy. The idea was sort of amusing, especially considering Harry didn't like the idea of having to break into the Ministry _again _to retrieve the same silly locket.

Harry continued his journey through the house. Two more passages on the first floor revealed little of interest. In fact, it was only when Harry arrived at the third floor did he find the prize of the house.

Harry walked into the ritual chamber and stopped short. He'd heard of them, of course, but only the oldest of the pureblood families ever had them – and, given the political climate Harry had grown up in, none had ever admitted it. Rituals of every type had been deemed illegal for the last one hundred fifty years. Harry, of course, had been witness to a horrifying variety of them in his short life, legal or otherwise. But it didn't change the fact that no one ever admitted to knowing about them or performing them.

He thumbed through a few ancient books detailing the White Family rituals. Nothing caught his eye, but a spark of an idea lodged itself in his head.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_July 17, 1977_

Master Auror Janus Wilmot had been easier to get ahold of than Harry expected. The man had been dispatched to a Death Eater raid at the home of a muggleborn Hogwarts student named Robert Billings (rising into 4th year, Hufflepuff). Harry had subdued the Death Eaters and was about to arrange for the entire Billings family to go into hiding when he spied his target.

Harry created portkeys to send the Billings family on its way. Then he waited and watched Auror Wilmot.

The man sent severing curses at two wounded, but not dead, Death Eaters. The man was doing his 'best' sort of work, cowardly and unworthy. Harry had killed Death Eaters, but only in the heat of battle…this lowly worm of a man was walking through and killing whoever he found. Coldly, without hesitation. It struck Harry as being wrong.

Harry had to bide his time for Wilmot to move away from his colleagues. Harry finally saw the opening he wanted. He picked up a small stone, turned it into a portkey to a secure cottage Harry used for his interrogations, and sent a number of high intensity stunners at the Master Auror. Harry caught the man unaware as he was trying to kill a third injured Death Eater, and the Auror slumped to the ground. Harry banished the portkey toward the Auror and watched the vile man disappear.

Harry looked closely at the remaining injured Death Eaters. He couldn't exactly leave them here for the Aurors to massacre them, could he? That wasn't right – and it would possibly change the entire timeline.

Harry created a half dozen portkeys and dispatched the wounded Death Eaters to St. Mungo's. There they would get some form of treatment and the Aurors couldn't just let loose with spells…but, given the corruption inside the Ministry, Harry fully expected to see them all 'escape' and make it back in battle. The second time Harry wouldn't be generous.

He apparated to where he'd sent the Billings family and left a brief note. He promised food and books (especially training materials for the young wizard) and safety.

Then he made his way to the Master Auror.

Harry searched the man before awakening him. He was as paranoid as Alastor Moody: three wands, four portkeys, six different potions. He had a notice-me-not charm on one of the portkeys and some kind of voice activated charm on one of the potions vials. Harry put all the items in a strong box and banished it outside the safehouse.

Harry bound the Master Auror and placed four drops of Veritaserum in his mouth. Harry woke the man and didn't give him any time to think or collect himself.

"How many Death Eaters have you killed?"

"Twenty nine."

Harry nodded. His official count was seven.

"Have you ever entered the Department of Mysteries?" The sole reason Harry had been looking for this particular Auror was to ask this question: Harry needed to determine a way to get inside the Department of Mysteries and recover Slytherin's locket. Damned bureaucrats and functionaries, they had one of vilest creations ever conceived and they just sat around and studied the magic that went into its creation.

Some forms of curiosity were dangerous.

The Auror's eyes went fuzzy for a second as he tried to resist answering Harry's question. He was obviously under a secrecy charm of some sort that was warring with the veritaserum.

Eventually he croaked out, "Yes."

"Where do they keep or study enchanted dark objects?"

He fought the charm again before blurting out, "The Chamber of Unraveling. It's where all the cursebreaking happens in the Department."

"Describe how to get inside the chamber."

The man said, "I can't. I know of it but not how to get inside it."

Of course it wouldn't be that easy.

"Have you ever seen a golden locket there with an 'S'…"

"The Slytherin locket?"

"That's the one. The Unspeakables know it came from Slytherin?"

"Yes. It's a fascinating object. No one has the first idea what kind of curses are on it."

Harry knew all too well what the foulest 'curse' was. He wish he didn't have to repeat history in quite this way. He wished the worthless piece of junk…well, he had to stomp on his emotions to keep from wasting time with this Master Auror.

"Why hasn't anyone destroyed it?"

"You'd sooner get an Unspeakable to cut off their own nose than destroy something they hadn't yet unraveled."

Harry kept his angry thoughts to himself.

"Who works with the locket?"

"I've heard of three teams working on it at various times. The only name I heard was Diricawl."

"A codename?"

"Yes."

"Do you know who Diricawl is?"

"No. All DoM identities are kept secure. We may know that such and such a person works there, but we never connect up street names with codenames…"

That was all he could get on the most important subject, that of the horcrux. His great clue was a name, the Diricawl, a sort of presumed-extinct bird. A Dodo bird. It wasn't a lot of help.

Harry turned the interrogation to another subject. "Do you modify the reports of your subordinates?"

"All the time."

"What specifically do you modify?"

"Anything that brings discredit to the Aurors."

Harry kept back his invective. He merely noted mentally that such conduct, 'brings discredit to the Aurors.'

"Have you ever reassigned blame for the killing of a civilian from an Auror to a Death Eater?"

"Of course."

"Does your boss Barty Crouch do anything to the reports?"

"When needed, yes."

"Have you ever accepted a bribe?"

"Of course." What an attitude to have about the whole thing.

"Has Crouch?"

"I don't know."

"Do you know who has been freeing prisoners?"

The Auror grumbled as much as could under the truth serum. "No, but I wish I did."

"Any suspicions?"

"A lot, but none of them have any evidence behind them."

Harry thought about what to do with this vile example of wizardry. "If you were looking for a safer world for everyone, what would you do with a rabid killer who had taken thirty lives?"

The man fought the truth serum for a few minutes. "I'd kill him."

Harry just nodded. "Obliviate."

He had some more thinking to do. He had wanted to handle Voldemort and his followers before dealing with the Ministry – but this Master Auror was easily on par with any Death Eater.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_September 13, 1977_

Harry sat in his flat in Manchester and listened to a meeting of the Order of the Phoenix. He'd managed to get listening charms inside the meeting room by enchanting the tea cups used at the Prewett Manor, their temporary headquarters. Harry listened to Arthur Weasley speak for a while on the security leaks that had led to muggleborns being identified by records from the Ministry. Moody interjected with several scathing attacks on the man's intelligence and dubious parentage.

Harry thought it was frightening that age had mellowed Moody from a near psychopath when it came to security (in 1977) to a mere paranoid delusional (in 1995).

Harry finally perked up when an old man named Parks began to speak about weird happenings inside St. Mungo's. "We've got four Aurors, including the just promoted Lead Auror Janus Wilmot, in one of the wards. No one can figure it out, but they're alive but not really functioning. It could be Cruciatus exposure; or severe use of Memory Charms; or a coma-inducing potion. We just don't know, but it's definitely a new tactic the other side is using…"

Moody, as usual, was the first to respond. "Wilmot was a rabid beast. Best thing that could have happened, I think."

Albus Dumbledore just tutted in response. "No one deserves that, Alastor."

Harry thought differently. He was the one responsible for their condition after all.

He'd used an old spell that he'd stumbled upon in his quest to finally get some protection from Legilimencers. The men were all alive, but Harry had locked their conscious minds away from active control of their bodies. (Harry had used the spell on himself, in a more limited fashion, to lock away sensitive information.) He could restore them any time he chose…but he didn't think he'd do that anytime soon. The four Aurors, including Miles Tavinish, had killed, rather than arrested, sixty two Death Eaters among them. By any measure, they were dangerous people who had no regard for the laws they were paid to enforce.

Harry smiled at the concept of 'regard for the law'. He, of course, had broken fundamental laws of time to come back and do this. He didn't have a high moral ground to preach from, but he did have his rules: the corruption had to go from both sides, from Voldemort as much as from Fudge and Crouch and Dumbledore.

Death Eaters targeted non-combatants to make a statement. Aurors and the Order of the Phoenix went after the Death Eaters in sometimes disastrous ways. They were tearing the world apart…and they didn't care. Everyone thought in the present, no one of the future.

That was Harry's burden, it seemed.

A new voice interrupted Harry's musing. After a while Harry pieced together who it was, Frank Longbottom, Neville's father.

"I asked my fiancee to start recruiting from among the students. She and I both agree that James Potter and Sirius Black would make excellent members…"

Harry smiled a bit. He hadn't caught much on his parents or his godfather since he'd returned in time, but every little bit was a joy. At the same time, Harry wished his parents had refused the Order and moved far away from Britain. He wished they'd gotten away from Voldemort and Dumbledore both.

It would only happen if Voldemort was dead and Dumbledore discredited by the day they graduated. It was a goal to work for…

Moody, again, had the first retort. "That Black, I don't know how we can trust him… He's Potter's friend, sure enough, but he's a Black. Bad blood will out…"

At that moment, Harry's own blood chilled. Marge Dursley had said something similarly revolting about his dead parents years and years ago.

"Now, Alastor, I've watched the boy for years. I've even been inside his head a few times. He's not like Orion or Walburga or even his younger brother Regulus."

The debate on James' being invited took no time at all. The conversation on Sirius consumed most of an hour. Harry realized why these people never did all that much during the first and second wars: they were always debating with each other. Dumbledore wasn't leading a war correctly; he wasn't even leading a meeting very well. Had the glow from defeating Gellert Grindelwald really made him seem that infallible when, in truth, he was barely competent?

Harry wondered if he needed to borrow from Rita Skeeter's bag of tricks and go for some character assassination to lessen Dumbledore's influence in the wizarding world.

Of all the problems Harry had to solve, dealing with Dumbledore was by far the most challenging, even more so than the horcruxes. He'd loved and revered the man for a long time – even come back from severe doubts about him in his late adolescence – and now he saw more and more of the disturbing truth surrounding the man.

Powerful, smart, cunning; arrogant, complacent, unwilling to wield his power, self satisfied, dismissive of the views of others, a user of other people's trust and lives, and far less competent than he projected. Dumbledore was all show and no substance, Harry finally realized. The man had good intentions or Fawkes would have left him, but he didn't do nearly enough to merit the reverence people held him in.

What to do?

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_October 11, 1977_

Harry Potter walked through the wards of Dumbledore Manor without a single problem. The old man was brilliant, true, but he was arrogant. He used powerful, obscure wards to protect his house…but they had little offensive power behind them. They relied upon confounding properties and repelling wards and secrecy charms and other 'lighter' methods of securing a property. They could also be bypassed rather than needing to be destroyed.

As it was, Harry had learned how to create and subvert them from books Albus Dumbledore's own portrait had suggested to Harry in the years after the war.

The Dumbledore Manor was a rather small, but sprawling, home. It was but a single story, but it was spread out in odd ways. It was unclear how the old building still stood…magic, perhaps. It swayed a bit in the light wind. Harry was not very excited about walking inside. It looked as crazy as Dumbledore acted at many public occasions.

He did eventually walk inside. He was the only being inside, as the Dumbledores had long ago freed their elves. He walked, disillusioned, from room to room examining everything and casting silent detection spells.

Inside what appeared to be a small office, Harry found something of interest: a pensieve. It was, in fact, the identical pensieve that Harry had viewed Death Eater trials in his fourth year at Hogwarts and memories about Tom Riddle in his sixth. Why had Dumbledore moved it to his office at the school in later years? Just for Harry's benefit?

He watched the swirl of memories inside the stone basin. He was rather resistant to the idea of leaving himself defenseless while viewing a number of memories – or allowing a projective viewing of the pensieve to trigger any sound-based wards Dumbledore might have established in his manor.

Harry settled on the difficult, but not impossible, step of copying the whole body of memories and storing the duplicate in a conjured glass jar he could take with him.

Three hours later Harry walked out of Dumbledore Manor with the duplicated memories – and a strong case of magical exhaustion. That kind of work required intense concentration and a massive amount of magical output.

It would be some time, days at least, before Harry would be back to his usual self. Perfect excuse to take a nap and then hole up while viewing the memories.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_November 6, 1977_

Harry hadn't realized how many decades worth of memories he had copied. Dumbledore hadn't stored every breakfast and bowel movement inside his pensieve, it just seemed like it. But on further reflection, the old wizard had captured memories of anything he considered worthy of further study. It was still a massive amount of information to sift through.

It did not, however, contain anything from his younger years, his association with Gellert Grindelwald, or any moment of the life of his sister Ariana.

Harry had made it through perhaps a hundred hours of memories by this point. It left only five or six hundred hours left, judging by the remaining mass of the memory strands.

Harry selected up another memory and stuck his head into the pensieve.

_A young looking Alastor Moody walked over to Dumbledore in a courtroom. Dumbledore flicked his wand and then bent his head over to the Auror._

"_Is it done, Alastor?"_

"_It is, but I don't like it, Dumbledore. It's a dirty business…"_

"_Crouch is the best man to prosecute the war, Alastor. Disqualifying the incumbent and the other opposition was necessary in this case…"_

"_I say you're the best one to prosecute the war. Bring the Order into the public sphere; take over the Auror branch. Hit them hard…"_

"_I'm not a politician or a policeman, my friend. The kind of things the Order can do are best planned with public scrutiny, you know that. Inside the Ministry, Crouch will do what needs to be done…"_

"_It's dirty tricks planting evidence on…"_

"_And I say, thank you. Obliviate."_

_Moody shifted a bit but didn't seem too overwhelmed by the erasure of his memory._

"…_I say, Alastor, that we need to get Diggle or Podmore together with a few of the new Order members to ensure they really understand what we're up against…"_

"_How about I duel each of them, give them a good hiding?"_

"_That could work as well, my friend. That could work…"_

The memory ended and Harry came out. He was angry at himself – angry at Dumbledore – angry at Moody.

Dumbledore, contrary to what Harry had claimed, had used some of his vaunted powers in the war effort…but only to condemn it to failure and severe loss of life. And he'd used a friend of his as his lowly thief-in-the-night…and rewarded Moody with the loss of his memory.

Why hadn't Harry seen any of this? Why hadn't anyone of the present timeline ever suspected? The man was cool and calm and vicious when need be. Why had Harry forgiven… The man used Obliviate more often than the breath freshening charm. Had he tried memory tricks on Harry, too? Had Harry not 'forgiven' the old man willingly? Had he lessened Harry's anger somehow after he'd died, after he'd met with Harry in that mental projection of King's Cross Station?

Harry didn't know what to think…other than to continue viewing the memories and documenting them for whatever sort of article or book he'd end up using to discredit Dumbledore.

It would be many months before he finished viewing all of it. Many months of pain.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_December 24, 1977_

Harry played Father Christmas to every hidden family under his protection. He didn't literally visit each hidden cottage, but he did send out his two house elves (acquired in Denmark to minimize the questions he might be asked in Britain) with special gifts and baskets of holiday foods.

He included in each basket a letter updating the families on the war.

_Dear Billings Family,_

_Enjoy the holiday cheer these gifts and foods can bring. Unfortunately, the war continues and it is not yet safe for you and your family to reappear in public. Many of us are working very hard to ensure the world will soon be safe for all families, all parents, and all children._

_There is an envelope at the bottom of this basket containing newspaper clippings over the last year. Do not worry about the non-combatant families mentioned as victims of raids. All of them are under protection right now similar to yours._

_Please let your house elf know if there is anything you need or want in the coming days and weeks. We all remain hopeful that this will be the last Christmas you and yours will need to spend in protection. For now, that is all we can say._

_Stay safe._

Harry felt the mounting pressure to find the last horcrux, to find it, and then destroy them all. But he didn't know how to get inside the Department of Mysteries and its Chamber of Unraveling.

Without that knowledge, walking inside the Ministry of Magic was akin to suicide.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_April 10, 1978_

Harry Potter had a bit of a lull in the official timeline between the raids he needed to prevent and a few other duties he needed to attend to. He was taking the opportunity to visit the United States for a few days to set up some provisions there: a safe house leased to "Andrew Thatcher," bank accounts under three different names, and a series of safe deposit boxes filled with gold bullion in New York and Maryland.

He had been very careful in the things he'd done so far…but the end of the Death Eaters was approaching and Harry wanted to have a further safe haven set up in case he were ever discovered by the Muggles or the magicals.

Constant vigilance: not just pretty words.

Harry enjoyed the sites. He spent a day walking through Manhattan, people watching and browsing in the stores. It was so far removed from his world, so insignificant. People scurried about in their jobs and their lives…doing nothing. Harry enjoyed the temporary sense of freedom.

He ate a hot dog from a vendor cart for lunch and had a three course French meal for dinner. He rather preferred the hot dog.

He liked spending time in Washington, D.C., even more. He walked the Mall, visited several of the Smithsonian museums, and walked among the dead in Arlington. He also spent a lot of time learning how to blend in as an 'American' should the need ever arise.

It was a fun exercise. It was almost like a vacation for a person who was almost like a human.

Harry had the most fun eating his way through America. There was some decent pizza to be found and a couple of interesting restaurants here and there. He'd found some incredible Southern barbeque in Washington and wonderful Italian and Chinese in New York. (Still, that hot dog rated pretty highly.)

It was good to have fun…and fun to have good food.

Harry lacked fun in his new life. Vengeance didn't usually allow for it, but Harry made exceptions now and again.

Too bad his return flight boarded in nine hours. Slipping out of reality every now and again was good for the soul.

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_May 29, 1978_

Harry was amazed at how little the timeline had changed. The warfare had gone considerably worse for Voldemort this time around, but he was still recruiting heavily from Britain, France, and Eastern Europe. The key for Voldemort is that it seemed like his campaign of terror was working: people 'died,' manor houses burned to the ground, the Dark Mark was seen several times a week. He was now at the height of his power and influence. (It began to wane a bit after the prophecy had been made originally, as Voldemort had become erratic and unfocused because of his pursuit of the Potters and Longbottoms.)

Tonight Harry had made the final decision on how to acquire the final horcrux and when he was going to destroy Voldemort. He would give himself a few weeks to acquire the locket, destroy all of the vile devices, and kill Voldemort on June 17, 1978 (the next time on Harry's timeline that Voldemort was known to personally attend a raid).

That day also happened to be four days before his parents would graduate from Hogwarts. Harry thought it a fitting gift.

He could no longer wait to make sure he had dealt with the final horcrux. Harry wanted to ensure some kind of peace in the British wizarding world before his parents graduated from Hogwarts. Harry, if he needed, could track down the final horcrux later and then deal with the Voldemort wraith that would inevitably make its way to Albania.

He was willing to compromise on his original plans, if he needed to, in order to be sure the Potters saw their son graduate from Hogwarts. The idea had been on his mind for some time.

His only fear about giving his parents this gift of peace was that he was mucking around in the timeline too much. That his parents wouldn't marry on time – or wouldn't have Harry on July 31, 1980 – or that Harry would be someone else entirely. Harry Potter had done everything, including technically killing himself, to ensure that one unborn child would grow up in a world of peace.

In Harry's mind, there was no 'greater good.' There was what was needed for Harry James Potter, infant extraordinaire, to grow up in the loving family he deserved…

He hoped all of this would work…and Harry would grow up the way a child should grow up: normally.

But, first, Harry had to focus on today…not on the day Voldemort died or the day he would be born. He needed to make some more changes _right now _for the better. Tonight was the night that the Prewett twins would get themselves killed if Harry didn't help things along.

According to the timeline, they were to be a part of the response team to a Death Eater attack on the Bones Mansion in Kent. The sadly ironic part was that Edgar Bones had already fled the place with his wife…and the response team was unnecessary.

Harry apparated to the place. The wards felt stale and unrefreshed, as if no one had cast any magic nearby for some time. Harry thought it was obvious the place was temporarily abandoned. He risked a quick jaunt over to one of the windows…and saw a large, empty room. The Bones' had even taken their belongings with them. Perfect!

Harry stepped back outside the wards and waited.

"I wonder exactly how the Order gets the message to come and assist," Harry muttered to himself. If it had been ward-triggered, Harry's exploration of the estate should have brought members along. It had to be something else…

Harry looked up when he heard apparition. Dark robes and masks: Death Eaters. But then Harry saw something he didn't expect, a Patronus-based messaging spell. It was an application for the Patronus Charm that Dumbledore himself had created. He certainly wouldn't have intended to teach it to Death Eaters…

Had a traitor in the Order just called for victims?

Traitors made Harry think of _that_ woman…and it made Harry seethe. There was nothing Harry hated more than betrayers.

Whoever the traitor was would die this night, Merlin willing and the Code of Harry be damned.

Harry watched as the crew of five Death Eaters quickly set to destroying the Bones Mansion. They'd obviously come expecting more of a fight. It was a few minutes before it arrived, however.

Gideon and Fabian Prewett, plus Alastor Moody, Dedalus Diggle, and Aberforth Dumbledore, arrived just outside the Bones wards. The Death Eaters pivoted and began a brutal assault. Moody, who still had his natural eyes and appendages, was knocked unconscious with a dark bludgeoner. Diggle was hit with a flame cutter and only a hastily thrown up shield saved his life.

Harry moved, under his Disillusionment spell, quietly near the Death Eaters. He didn't know which one had sent the Patronus spell, but he was going to find out.

Aberforth sent an oddly colored yellow spell at one of the Death Eaters. The recipient promptly fell over shrieking in pain. 'Good one,' Harry thought. He resolved to try to figure out what spell did that.

Then Harry did a little bit of magic. He had earned his Dueling mastery while competing on the professional circuit after Hogwarts (in the Quidditch off seasons while he played for Puddlemere), but he was most proud of the Mastery he earned in Spell Design. His Master's project was a nonverbal spell that bent magic in a specified direction: it was in place of shielding or dodging, of course. It worked on all spells, even the Unforgivables which still were unblockable via direct magical shielding.

Harry used his magic bending spells in slight ways to ensure that Death Eater spells hit other Death Eaters. The tallest cloaked man sent off the Cruciatus Curse – which Harry forced to miss one of the Prewett twins – and then a Cutting Curse which seemed to fly out of his wand at a weird angle. The Cutting Curse sliced off another Death Eater's wand hand.

The battle turned from there. Two Death Eaters down, three remaining. Three Order members remaining. Harry ensured nothing the Death Eaters cast hit the Order, while the Order had free reign on the black-robed attackers.

The battle ended without additional Order casualties five minutes later.

Aberforth unmasked the Death Eaters. Antonin Dolohov – he who had nearly bisected Hermione at the Department of Mysteries battle so many decades earlier in Harry's remembering – had lost his wand hand. Aberforth staunched the flow. Another was Lucius Malfoy. The surprise member was Sturgis Podmore, a member of the Order of the Phoenix, the traitor.

One of the Prewett twins was the first to react. "How did that blasted Phoenix let Sturgis in if he's sold us out to the Death Eaters?"

Aberforth offered an angry shrug. "My brother never has been too concerned with security. God only knows what foolish thing he'll conjure up to say about this."

The other twin shook his head in disgust, but was more concerned with Moody and Diggle. "We need to get them to a Healer, gents."

Aberforth nodded. "You lot get them mended. I'll stay here with our friends, especially this Mr. Podmore. Foolish bunch can't even aim their wands, can they?"

Harry just smiled. He hoped his revision of history this evening would hold. He hoped Molly Weasley would have her elder brothers for a long time to come.

Harry stuck around the Bones Mansion even after two Order members Harry didn't know came to collect the five Death Eaters. Aberforth went with them.

Harry wanted to see when or if the Aurors would show up to a burning Mansion. He wanted to continue his evaluation. So far very few Aurors looked like decent people in any respect.

Finally, fifteen minutes after the battle had concluded, Harry heard more apparition. Four Aurors, including one strangely familiar female Auror, came into view.

"Three false alarms and then this. The ancestral home is a wreck. There's tons of scorching and even a goodly pool of blood – and, oh my, a severed hand…"

Harry tuned out the rest. He had finally placed the Auror's voice: Amelia Bones, sister to the Edgar Bones who had owned this Mansion. Poor lady.

Harry was getting ready to apparate back to his flat when he heard something most interesting.

"Dodo, mark down needing to investigate who put in those false alarms. It stalled us by a good fifteen or twenty minutes."

"Amelia, don't call me Dodo…" That clinched it for Harry. It was a name he was ashamed of. But it wasn't terribly embarrassing. It was highly confidential.

The word Dodo, Harry knew, was another name for the _Diricawl_. And that was the name of an Unspeakable working on Slytherin's locket. Had the man's Auror nickname followed him to the Department of Mysteries in a morphed form? It was the best line Harry had into getting inside information on the Chamber of Unraveling.

"With a name like Disraeli Dreckmuller Doge, you object to the nickname Dodo? I see," said Amelia Bones with a high level of amusement in her tone.

Harry decided he would be making friends with this Mr. Doge. Very good friends.

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_June 8, 1978_

Years into his work as an Auror, Harry had given up on his prejudices concerning the Dark Arts. He'd had to learn the damned things, hadn't he? Even the Unforgivables. So he didn't feel particularly upset or nervous when he put his final horcrux recovery plan into effect.

His revised plan was safer and much more likely to work than the earlier ones he'd conceived of… It wasn't legal, but Harry didn't care at this point. He just wanted Voldemort dead and the killings to stop. There was a world to secure.

Harry had discovered where Mr. Doge lived in London. The man didn't even use wards. Harry arrived at the man's home before sunrise and walked inside. His wife and two children were put into deep sleeps. Mr. Doge was put under the Imperius Curse.

"You will go to work early this morning because of an experiment you must oversee. Then you will procure the Slytherin Locket and feign an illness. You will bring the locket to this flat. You have until nine thirty to return."

The man hopped to his task, dressing rapidly and with no useless motions. Harry felt Doge's will trying to fight with his own, but Doge really was a weak wizard.

Harry felt very good about this plan. The Ministry – even after numerous pleas through the next two decades, in the original timeline – wouldn't erect anti-Imperius wards until 1999. What a ridiculous bungle of bureaucracy.

Harry sat patiently and was rewarded. At eight fifty, Disraeli Doge returned with the locket. Harry had part two already to go.

"Tomorrow you will return to work earlier than normal. You will look pale, but not nauseous. You will catch up with your other duties. Then at ten o'clock, you will conduct an experiment on this locket. You will cast any four spells on it and record them in your research journal. The fifth spell will be the Dark magic cleansing spell _Amplector_. The locket will explode. Once that happens, you will pass out for five hours. When you reawaken, you will no longer be under my control. Nor will you have the last two days worth of memories. You will forget them forever."

Harry walked out of the flat clutching the last horcrux. He had spent many months chasing it originally and had added about another two years in this timeline. Harry was looking forward to the final resolution.

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	4. Endings Are Easy

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**Chapter 4: Endings Are Easy**

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_June 11, 1978_

For the first time since he'd arrived, Harry returned to the little clearing in the forest where he'd transitioned over to King's Cross and then to the past. He needed someplace relatively anonymous and safe for the bit of work he was about to do.

He laid out the horcruxes – including the already destroyed Peverell ring horcrux – in front of him. The diary, the diadem, the Hufflepuff cup, and the blasted locket. He wanted any possible alert to Voldemort about their destruction to occur as close to the Voldemort's death as possible.

Harry smiled and pulled out his wand. He was about to perform the single most lethal fire spell still in practice (legend held that Merlin could create something called Phoenix Fire, but no one claimed to know its exact properties).

He pointed his wand at the diary and said the incantation. "Fiendfyre."

Within seconds the diary was less than ash. Harry felt the nauseating pulse of Dark magic as the soul fragment inside the diary ceased to exist. He quickly cancelled the spell before the thing got out of control. It was strong enough magic to conjure fiery animals who could attack opponents with sufficient mental control.

He quickly destroyed the bit of the Peverell ring – just to be sure – and moved on to the Ravenclaw diadem, the cup, and the Slytherin locket. Two years. It had taken him almost exactly two years to accomplish all this.

Two years of disrupting raids.

Two years of slowly disposing of the gold he'd brought back with him.

Two years of worrying and wondering.

Two years of hiding supposed war victims and ferrying select letters back and forth to ensure that a few people knew the truth.

Two years of evidence gathering and gathering anger.

Two years leading to now…to when he'd be done with Voldemort…to when he'd be ready to take on Dumbledore and the Ministry.

Two years of investing for the future.

Two years spent, hopefully, making a better future.

Two years hoping. For no good reason.

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_June 15, 1978_

Harry satisfied his nervous anxiety by putting the finishing touches on the books and articles he planned to unleash on the wizarding world in the coming days and weeks. He'd accidentally brought along a copy of that vile Rita Skeeter's book on Dumbledore in his library from the future. Harry had quickly plagiarized it months ago and edited it down to a reasonable length (no Rita-style commentaries, nothing past 1977, and certainly no references to Harry Potter). He had also peppered the text with actual transcripts of conversations Dumbledore had had, ones he'd stored in his pensieve. Harry had also gone back to Dumbledore Manor to copy several of the photographs the man had kept.

The book would never be a classic, like Bathilda Bagshot's _A History of Magic_ but it would serve its purpose. Plus Harry preferred for Dumbledore to be alive to try to wriggle out of the surprisingly true accusations within its pages.

Harry had long been at work in his spare moments on a series of articles on the Aurors that was quite damning. The names of the four incapacitated Aurors had been bandied about in the press. Harry had taken the records he'd recovered from three of them to compare the 'before' and 'after' versions of their reports. He could lay dozens of Death Eater fatalities at their feet, in addition to more than twenty fatalities of non-combatants. Let the present Aurors and Barty Crouch dance their way out of that.

As for Crouch in particular, Harry didn't expect the man would be able to withstand the other part of his plan for Voldemort… It would be disturbing and shattering in so many ways.

There were an entire series of articles on the failings of the Wizengamot. The old Chief Warlock Callus Umbridge was in for a flogging as were Dumbledore and eighteen other named bigots on the body. Harry thought the most destructive article would be, "Orphans Deprived of Rights, Ancestral Lands, Family Heirloom and Moneys by Wizengamot Decisions." Adults could care less about most other adults, but most of them had soft spots for abandoned orphans and official malfeasance.

There was a small pamphlet ready called the "Corruption Detailed of British Ministry Officials Bagnold, Fudge, Philacter, and Prosody."

Finally, there was a scathing book – which Harry had plagiarized from another, more interesting book he'd brought back with him called "The Dark Years: Voldemort and the Death of Liberty" – which would examine the Daily Prophet's role in 1) subtly supporting Death Eater propaganda on pureblood supremacy, 2) underplaying the devastation caused by Death Eater raids and attacks, and 3) protecting the officials at the Ministry who paid bribes to the owner and certain editors of the newspaper.

The strongest part of the plan was for the articles to originate as investigative reporting outside Britain. The Dumbledore book would be published in America by a small magical press, followed three months later by the book on the Daily Prophet from the same press. The articles on the Aurors would come from a skeptic's magazine in Ireland that had a small, intelligent following in Britain. France would take the lead on bashing Britain's ancient form of jurisprudence. Harry expected it would be some time before all his articles and books fully permeated the British mindset – but, as the victor, Harry would make sure he was writing the history this time.

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_June 17, 1978._

Harry stood outside in the very early morning. The original timeline had recorded this date as when Voldemort himself, plus a crew of his Death Eaters, went to kill the Muggle parents of three past and present Hogwarts students: the Ransome family.

Harry Potter could barely contain his excitement and nervousness.

If he hadn't screwed up the timelines too badly, Voldemort would be dead within an hour. And all his other plans – mostly on hold until Voldemort was destroyed – could move forward.

The ambush, Harry knew, would work. Voldemort wasn't suspecting it. He didn't know he was being hunted or that all his raids of the past two years had failed to kill their targets. He also didn't know his horcruxes were destroyed – and that he was as mortal as the next man.

The main problem wouldn't be with killing Voldemort…it would be dealing with the Death Eaters after they'd witnessed their leader being struck down.

As of today, the Code of Harry was no more. He was destroying the timeline, so his earlier measures no longer mattered. If a person stood with Voldemort in his last minutes, Harry had no mercy for him or her.

It was to be total war…

Harry heard the apparition. The Death Eaters and Voldemort had landed twenty meters in front of Harry – and that much closer to their targets of the evening.

Harry wasn't going to speechify or attempt to 'reform' Voldemort or delay things. He drew his wand, leveled it at Voldemort's chest, and sent his most powerful Reductor Curse flying. Then he turned and cursed two of the Death Eaters before the first spell hit Voldemort.

Harry had his attention divided between Voldemort and the others he'd brought with him.

The first curse impacted and suddenly there was an eight inch hole in Voldemort's chest. The dying beast grunted and shouted, "Treachery."

The other two curses found their targets: the right shoulder of one Death Eater and the pelvis of another. Harry was purposefully making the shots look like they'd come from different angles and different wizards. To the wizarding world, this had to look like a real battle or ambush, not just a massacre conducted by a lone assassin.

Harry ran from his previous location on silenced feet. The three remaining Death Eaters were in shock, but likely not for long. Voldemort was whispering things or trying to.

Harry turned to his Cutting Curses. One fell to the ground before he'd even drawn his wand. The last two decided to fight back. One of them was particularly agile. Harry kept running and firing, but so did the Death Eaters.

He felt the crushing pain of the Cruciatus Curse touch him, but he ran through the pain. It was the first time he'd been hit in a duel or in battle in twelve years. The action gave Harry the anger necessary to return fire with an overpowered severing charm. The Death Eater was now without an arm. He fell to the ground in a piteous heap.

The last Death Eater had disillusioned him or herself. This one had a bit of intelligence, but wasn't smart enough to disapparate away from the scene.

Harry was an expert stalker.

It took only one spell – a silent _Homenum revelio _– to show Harry exactly where the Death Eater was. Harry let the person calm down and become a bit complacent. Then he lifted his wand and sent three of his most powerful Reductors against the invisible target.

The fallen Death Eater would never move again.

Harry stalked through the battle scene, in a patch of forest behind the target's home, and stopped before Voldemort. The distorted wizard was still barely alive. "Tom Riddle, your horcruxes are destroyed. When you perish, you will be gone forever."

Voldemort's face screwed up in horrified anger. But he couldn't speak. He could only slowly take his last gurgled breath…and die.

Harry unmasked the five Death Eaters. Harry was sad for a moment when he saw Lucius Malfoy – Draco Malfoy would never come to exist in this timeline – but quite pleased when he saw the face of Barty Crouch Junior, his former 'teacher' during the Triwizard Tournament. According to the old timeline, Crouch had participated in this raid the first time around, as he'd revealed during his interrogation.

This death, publicized in the right way, would help to ensure the end of Barty Crouch Sr.'s power in the Ministry.

The others were Amycus Carrow, Callus Umbridge (who'd never been unmasked as a Death Eater in the original timeline at all), and Walden McNair.

Harry pondered over how to make it known that Voldemort was dead. Something dramatic; something that ensured Barty Crouch's dead body was shown with Voldemort's; something to sear this into the public consciousness.

Harry had a grim smile on his face as the solution came to him.

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_June 17 – 18, 1978_

Harry apparated back to one of his safe houses where he'd already prepared for the next step. Two press releases were already winging their way to two hundred organizations and individuals: "Voldemort Killed with Five Death Eaters; Bodies, on Pikes, on Display in Diagon Alley." "Suspected War Victims to Reenter Wizarding World Following Voldemort's Death; Ceremony at Noon Outside Tintagel."

Harry began the process of notifying the forty-one families he'd hidden that Voldemort was dead. He wore an appropriate glamour: brown haired, scarred, a prominent jaw, oversized cheek bones, gray eyes. He looked nothing like a Potter.

Most broke into tears at the news. Harry had been sure to supply the families with the Daily Prophet for the last few months, after one family requested it through Kepler the House Elf, and any other news sources he could find to ensure their temporary exile wouldn't leave them too far behind in current events. They knew what kind of havoc Voldemort was reported to have caused.

He made his final stop at the home of his grandparents. For the first time ever, Harry would get to speak with them. Timelines no longer mattered.

"Sir, Madam, the war is over," Harry said after he was admitted.

"Who won?" His grandfather was taking no chances.

"Voldemort and five senior Death Eaters were killed very early this morning. My employer asked me to let you know. There will be a ceremony to reunite you with the wizarding world…"

"Who is your employer?"

Harry just smiled. "An individual who cared very much that people survive the war…"

"While some might consider this being locked up, my boy, I _came_ to appreciate the effort. But I can't say I won't be glad to leave this place. I've had a few letters from my son, but I want to see him again, you know… He's graduating in a couple of days. I guess we'll get to attend in person, rather than just in spirit."

Harry just nodded.

"Ma'am, is there anything you need?"

"Just to go home…"

"Excuse me," Harry said, "your Manor was destroyed in the attack. I thought you knew…"

His grandmother just nodded. "I did. Home is where my family is. A pile of stones is easily rebuilt."

"I see."

Harry turned to leave when he felt a hand on his shoulder. "Is there nothing we can explain about who has cared for us the past year?"

Harry turned back around to face his grandfather. "It was a private individual, sir. People may try to spin stories about the government doing this – or people may try to claim credit for themselves. But, know this: the individual who has done this for you and the other rescued families will _never_ come forward to take credit. Remember that."

His grandmother smiled. "Thank you again. I don't suppose you can tell us your name?"

Harry shook his head. "I'm afraid not, ma'am."

Harry then walked out of the cottage and into the waiting firestorm his actions had caused.

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_June 21, 1978_

Harry Potter attended the graduation ceremony of his parents, James Potter and Lily Evans. He used another glamour this time: strawberry blonde hair, a moustache to hide the features of his face, and unchanged green eyes. He could be a distant relative to the Weasleys or an unknown Muggleborn wizard or anything at all.

The first round of articles was out, many not even written by Harry. The Daily Prophet was apparently feeling unrestrained after so many years of obeying the whims of the Ministry.

The image of Barty Crouch's son on a pike next to Voldemort had made the front page of the Prophet and would become an iconic image. Barty Crouch Sr. had been forced to resign.

The Irish pamphlet and expose on Bagnold, Fudge, and others had already backed all of them into a corner. Cornelius Fudge was rumored to have hung himself this morning now that copies of his bank records had been made public and his corruption was known. Neither Bagnold nor any of the others would ever hold Ministerial office again.

The coming week would be even more tumultuous. The Dumbledore book would be coming out on Monday in America and the rumors would fly quickly to Britain…plus the articles on the abuses of the Aurors and the covering up done by the Department of Magical Law Enforcement would be out on Thursday.

Of course, after the known bumblers and incompetents were gone, Harry's job would only get harder. He'd have to sit in judgment of a number of people who'd never held power in the first timeline. What might they do?

Would Dolores Umbridge still entrench herself there – even with her powerful grandfather, Callus, dead and exposed as a Death Eater? Would Arthur Weasley, Amelia Bones, and Amos Diggory make the same kinds of contributions? Would an unmarred Moody remain a 'Ministry malcontent'? Would that vile woman Tatiana Edgecombe still try to turn the Floo office into a home for blood purists? Would Kingsley Shacklebolt even enter Ministry service this time around (the man had another two years of Hogwarts to complete first).

Harry's head snapped up when the ceremony held in the Quidditch pitch finally got underway.

He listened as Dumbledore and the present Head of the Board of Governors – a wizard named Tiberius Ogden – gave brief speeches that garnered lots of applause, especially the bits about the ending of the civil war. Minerva began calling out the names of the graduates, but she had a tough time keeping everyone serious during such a jubilant time.

"Evans, Lily." Harry watched his mother walk to Professor Dumbledore and accept her Hogwarts Diploma. She shook the hand of Governor Ogden, smiled for the photographer, and gracefully returned to her seat. Harry looked in the audience. He saw someone who looked a bit like his Aunt Petunia had – was that his maternal grandmother? He didn't see anyone who looked like a young Petunia. She'd probably refused to attend out of jealousy and spite.

"Potter, James." Here the cheering came from all over before James even stood up. Wormtail was clapping (Harry still hadn't decided what to do with him…as the vile betrayer wouldn't be given the same chance to betray his parents this time around). James' parents were cheering. Sirius was almost jumping up and down. His father made his way from his seat. He had the goofiest expression on his face as he accepted his diploma from Dumbledore. About the time James was in front of the camera, a giant poof of smoke erupted near Dumbledore and the man's tasteful, sedate formal robes became a garish mixture of orange and purple.

The entire audience burst into laughter at the Marauders' last official prank at Hogwarts.

James returned to his seat amidst the laughter. Even the normally dour McGonagall couldn't keep the smile from her face.

Harry watched the rest of the ceremony with a content smile on his face. As he had never gone through the ceremony – with his nominal seventh year of school a giant mess where many people died and the school partially leveled in the attacking – it was wonderful to witness.

After Dumbledore dismissed everyone, Harry watched as James, Sirius, Lily, Remus, and Peter congregated together. Lily's parents were introduced probably for the first time to James'.

Harry Potter felt a bit sad that he would never really get to know his parents, his godfather, his grandparents from both sides. But he had begun this mission for one reason: vengeance. That objective plus a happy life weren't able to co-exist.

Harry quickly left the grounds before any of the Marauders could be bothered to open their Map and see the name of Harry Potter on it. He wondered if Filch already had it in his possession…

It didn't matter as there was always more work to do.

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_June 29, 1978_

Harry had been busy in the week since his parents' graduation from Hogwarts. The book on Dumbledore had barely made the rounds before Dumbledore lost his position as Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot in a no confidence vote. He still had a seat on the body, as did all holders of an Order of Merlin, but he no longer determined its agenda or sidestepped the rules as if he owned them.

That was the good news. One the flip side, the Aurors were so disorganized with the chaos in their ranks that no one was moving to round up the still-free Death Eaters.

The articles that had been coming out on the Auror problems had seven of them on suspension and the overall department without its top three layers of leadership. The Minister for Magic, Reynaldo Helfgott, had just made Alastor Moody Interim Head Auror after giving the man a public veritaserum hearing: Alastor, thankfully, had come out clean of lying, taking bribes, and killing innocents and wounded Death Eaters.

But Moody still had to come up to speed. He had an entire department to check for traitors, violent thugs, and every other kind of problem – and he had to do it all publicly to reinstill confidence in the Aurors. He was focused internally for now. Harry decided to give him some persuasion to work on the remaining Death Eaters.

Harry sat waiting for a meeting to start in the woods outside the Lestrange Manor. He'd been keeping tabs on the known Death Eaters from the prior timeline. He'd only caught a hint of this meeting the day prior from one of the listening charms he'd set in Knockturn Alley.

Apparently the remnants of the Death Eaters were trying to decide what to do – flee from Britain before the Aurors captured them, claim bewitchment and use money to stay out of Azkaban, attempt to reorganize around a new leader, or just hope for the best.

Harry set up listening charms nearby. Each one was tied to a crystal Harry had on him. He was going to make an audio record of this 'meeting' which would fall into Auror hands, along with the more permanent results he intended to ensure.

Rodolphus Lestrange, a young bachelor still, strode into the clearing first. After all, it was his recently inherited home. He waited silently for a few minutes before Augustus Rookwood showed up.

"About time," Rodolphus said. "I was beginning to think Avery, Flint, and you weren't going to show…"

Rookwood shook his head. "Avery and Flint aren't coming. They've apparently made up their minds. They'll wait for the Aurors and claim the Imperius defense, along with Goyle and Crabbe and a few others…"

"The bloody cowards…"

"What about Bole?"

Rookwood shrugged. "Haven't heard from him or Pucey or Corner. Rowle has already left the country. Gibbon has been completely ignoring all my messages, so I have no idea what he's planning…"

Another man stalked out of the forest. "Gibbon has changed his name and gone into hiding."

Rookwood turned to look at the new arrival, while Lestrange just nodded his head.

"Welcome Vindicus. That's bad news for Gibbon, then. They'll find him eventually and he'll look all the more guilty for it," said Rodolphus.

Rookwood looked at the new person, too. "Bulstrode, did you use proper precautions? You led those fools from the Order of the Phoenix to a meeting once before…"

"I took the precautions, Rookwood…"

"Is no one else coming," Rodolphus asked.

Both of his listeners shrugged. Bulstrode held up his hand and pointed to his fingers. "I know Nott has put his Manor into a state of readiness to seal up if he's arrested. Rosier buried his father and is just waiting for the Aurors to come. I think he's preparing to testify…"

"Merlin," Rookwood exclaimed. "If he does, no one will be able to claim Imperius…"

Rodolphus looked amused. "I don't think anyone should be able to claim it. Sure Mulciber used it on a number of Ministry types to get us records of where the Mudbloods lived…but none of them were even supporters which is why they were selected, you see… The best one was Arthur Weasley under the curse hauling out records of which wizards had registered owning muggle televisions that ran off magic instead of ekel…instead of whatever."

Harry had to swallow deeply to keep from calling out. Had the numerous spies and saboteurs inside the Ministry all been reasonably innocent Imperius victims? It sort of made sense…but Arthur. Harry felt rage for the poor man.

"Jugson," Rodolphus asked.

"Never liked him. Don't know much about him," Bulstrode said. Rookwood just shook his head.

"What about the idiots who were freed from the Ministry?" Bulstrode asked.

"Barton Scrimgeour? He's back under arrest. His own brother brought him in. Saved Rufus from being suspended as he's not terribly clean in the Auror investigation. Bastard used the Cruciatus on me a year ago before I managed to escape from a raid gone wrong. Hierophant Umbridge has already claimed Imperius and his toad of a sister is helping him mount a defense. I can't believe the Magical Creatures department would hire a woman who looks like she does… Sure, have a bit of fluff, but make sure it's attractive, right?"

"Her dead father got her the job," Rookwood said. "She'll likely be gone if anyone with half a brain does a clean up…"

Rodolphus sighed. "All our power. All our contacts. It's all gone. The best and brightest minds of three generations are dead or likely to be imprisoned…"

Bulstrode chuckled. "I wouldn't call Umbridge or Jugson or Travers very bright…"

Rookwood smiled. "But that Lockhart fellow, Talmadge, he certainly had some convincing stories to his name…and then there were the Yaxleys, brilliant and cruel."

"What are the Yaxleys doing?"

"They've decided not to claim Imperius and not to flee…They even refused to help the Karkaroffs and the other foreign fighters in their efforts to leave. I think Reginald Yaxley said, 'Burn with us or burn without us. Your soul is already judged.'"

Even Rodolphus seemed impressed at that. "People with backbone."

"And the other supporters? Runcorn in Magical Transportation; Hopkirk in the Misuse of Underage Magic Office; Kentleworth in Games and Sports; and that wizard with that revolting mole in the Wizengamot Office?"

None of them knew…

But Harry finally had enough for his recording crystals. He was preparing to launch his attack until he heard something very curious.

"What about the Dark Lord's wife?"

Harry stopped. Voldemort had taken a wife? Did the evil man have children? The very notion began giving Harry waking nightmares.

"I heard Daphnis Kantor killed herself the day after the Dark Lord died…"

"The child died, too, then?"

Rookwood just shook his head. "It would have been the Dark Heir. They were sure the baby would have been a boy."

Harry let out a silent sigh of relief. He then began to wonder why none of this had ever come out before. Harry had never heard the name Daphnis Kantor before tonight or the possibility of a child. Had Daphnis died in the original timeline before giving birth? Or had she snuck away with her child to a different part of the world… Even with as much research as Harry had done, he still learned new and disturbing things everyday.

Harry decided to let the men talk for a bit longer. He didn't want any more surprises to stay hidden.

When it appeared the meeting with breaking up, Harry moved to act. He cast the Imperius Curse on Vindicus Bulstrode and had him say a few words. "In case I didn't mention it, gents, I'm going to pick up the pieces and rid the world of all the cowards…"

Then the Harry-controlled Bulstrode cast Avada Kedavra at Rodolphus and a bludgeoner at Rookwood. Rodolphus Lestrange dropped to the ground dead. The enraged Roodwood shot Bulstrode with the Avada Kedavra curse just as Bulstrode set Rookwood on fire.

It was a tiny miracle of timing – and all recorded for posterity. All the names of the surviving followers. The tactics they'd used. The plans they'd laid to escape punishment, including detailed analysis of the Imperius defense. And then a double cross from inside the group.

Harry broke the listening charms, but stuck two of the crystals inside Rodolphus Lestrange's robes. The Aurors would find the bodies, along with the recording crystals, soon enough.

Harry would judge them by what they did with the information.

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_August 3, 1978_

Harry spread out the Daily Prophet (Double Edition) in front of him. It was quite a bit of reporting.

"Voldemort Supporters Arrested Within the Ministry; Eight in Holding Cells."

"Nineteen Former Death Eaters Swept Up in Raids."

"Ministry Sets Rules for Public Trials; Veritaserum For All Witnesses."

"Ministry of Magic Appeals to France, Bulgaria, and Russia for Extradition of Dozens of Suspected Death Eaters."

"Negotiations with Gringotts Continue Over Use of Death Eater Funds as Reparations to Victims."

"Dumbledore to Face Inquiry Over Actions as Chief Warlock."

"Bartemius Crouch Arrested for Massive Ministry Coverups."

Harry liked the news he was reading. It all pointed to thinks getting better in Britain. But, as Moody had always said, practice Constant Vigilance.

It was possible the Ministry would go too far and accuse the innocent of crimes they hadn't committed. Harry would read the trial transcripts and continue probing the minds of people he encountered from time to time. It was possible that the Ministry would slip back into the corrupt morass it had previously found itself within. That too would be monitored.

But, most of all, Harry feared Dumbledore running roughshod over the Ministry. The man, even in his current circumstances, could turn to more than persuasion to retake a position of importance…the man could use compulsions, or trusting potions, or even the Imperius Curse for outright control.

Dumbledore was now the main obstacle, as Harry saw it, to a better Britain. But he was giving the old wizard the benefit of the doubt. He had a seat on the Wizengamot and the Headmastership of Hogwarts…if that contented him, Harry would leave him along so long as he stopped mucking around where he wasn't needed.

That wasn't to say that Harry didn't keep up his spying on the old man. He kept listening charms in many places and on many different items of clothing. Harry had tagged Dumbledore several different times when he'd seen the man out in public.

He pulled out a recording crystal and tapped it with his wand.

"Thank you for coming to tea, Elphias…" Harry recognized the name: Elphias Doge, an old friend of Dumbledore's.

"Of course, old friend. I was very saddened that the Order seemed to have crumbled as it did…"

"Yes, that book from America had its effect."

"Why haven't you refuted the charges, Albus?"

Dumbledore was quiet for a few moments. "Because most of the allegations are true…"

"You can't be serious…"

"Unfortunately, I did know and befriend Gellert in our younger years. And I did make some decisions that turned out to have questionable merit regarding the estates of certain orphaned children in recent years…"

"You allowed the Ministry to steal from children…without respecting the wills left by their parents?"

Albus said nothing, but Harry assumed the man had nodded.

"I've been your friend a long time, Albus, but I don't…I just don't understand how you could do these things…and not tell _me_ at least. I'd have tried to talk you out of some of it…or at least given you some sort of comfort…"

"Embarrassment, I suppose, kept me from speaking of it. I didn't like the even think about what happened with Gellert…I know Aberforth still hates me for it to some extent, after all it cost us both our sister."

"But the laws…and disregarding wills…and giving the Ministry that kind of power…"

"It's all been reversed. The past, my friend, is best left in the past."

"Right now, very few think that. You're going to have some hard times ahead of you, Albus."

"I know. I'll weather it."

Doge was quiet for a few moments. "I hope so, but I wouldn't expect it. Pull back and stay out of politics, Albus. Whoever knows all this about you seems not to have decided to destroy you, just rap you on the nose and tell you to behave. I don't know what would happen if you didn't take the warning."

"I'm an old man, Elphias, and I've seen many things. I'll survive…"

"That doesn't sound like someone planning to drop out of politics, Albus."

"I'm not. I'll lay low for a while, but I won't let the world careen around willy-nilly…"

"You know my counsel, old friend. I pray you listen to it."

"Thank you, Elphias. More tea?"

Harry listened to the rest of the crystal but the two old men just talked about their other old friends and old memories. At the least, it was proof that Dumbledore had done what the book had accused him of – and that Dumbledore wasn't withdrawing.

Harry would keep a very close eye on his former Headmaster. He'd had his single warning. He would not get a second one.


	5. The Birth of Hope

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**Chapter 5: The Birth of Hope**

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_September 7, 1978_

Harry had just returned from seeing his father play his first game for the Kestrels. Harry had forgotten how much he had loved Quidditch. It was good to see the same look of pure joy on his father's face.

Then there had been the small announcement in the Daily Prophet: "Potter Heir to Marry Lily Evans."

History was coming together. It hadn't been just the heightening war or the death of Harry's grandparents that had driven his mother and father together. There was something real there. James had loved Lily for years; it seemed Lily really did love him back.

It was more than probable that a little Harry James Potter would be born on July 31, 1980 with messy black hair and green eyes.

Harry sat down in a transfigured chair and just grinned. He hadn't felt this happy since he'd returned in time. He had gotten to see his father's professional Quidditch debut. What a treat!

He conjured himself some tea and sat and replayed the game in his mind. His father had performed well – not as a superstar – and made seven shots, scoring on four of them. The game had been a short one, barely thirty five minutes in total.

He was glad his father had been able to go into Quidditch rather than immediately join the Auror training program, as he had done in the original timeline. Perhaps James would still become an Auror at some point, perhaps not. (The same went for the still unborn Harry Potter…Harry just hoped that his younger self would find something he loved to do.)

Harry sipped his tea and opened the Daily Prophet he picked up after the game. The front page held nothing of interest. No, the good stuff was mentioned on the society page (the wedding announcement) and also buried on pages six and seven: transcripts from the first public Death Eater trials for three men who had been sent to Azkaban previously without trial.

_Transcripts of the Trials of Randall Lovage, Quentin Greengrass, and Pericule Crispbottom._

_Chief Warlock Griselda Marchbanks, presiding. "Ladies and gentlemen, for our public trials the official transcripts will be taken by the Ministry _and_ the Daily Prophet to ensure accuracy. Bring in the accused. We have two tasks today: to determine if the three accused are members of the Death Eaters, a group labeled as a terrorist threat by the Ministry of Magic, and to determine how these three individuals wound up in Azkaban prison without trials before the Wizengamot. The lead inquisitor for the trial shall be Interim Head Auror Alastor Moody."_

_Alastor Moody. "Administer the Veritaserum to Mr. Lovage. Mr. Lovage, do you admit to being a marked follower of the wizard known as Lord Voldemort?"_

_Randall Lovage: "Yes."_

_Moody: "Did you kill anyone on the orders of Lord Voldemort?"_

_Lovage: "No."_

_Moody: "Did you participate in any Death Eater raids?"_

_Lovage: "Yes, sir, one raid."_

_Moody: "Why only one?"_

_Lovage: "I was disgusted by what I saw and allowed myself to be captured at the raid, sir."_

_Moody: "Are we sure the Veritaserum is working? Has this man really not killed anyone?"_

_Lovage: "No, sir, I haven't."_

_Moody: "One test for the Truth Serum. Tell me your worst experience at Hogwarts."_

_Lovage: "Peeves the Poltergeist pushed me off a moving staircase and I landed on three girls the floor below, one of whom I had a crush on…"_

_Moody: "That's enough. No one would willingly own up to that. Why weren't you tried, Lovage?"_

_Lovage: "No idea, sir. I was interviewed under Veritaserum by three Aurors and a stern man called Crouch. I told them the same things I've said today…"_

Harry stopped reading there. He was reassured by what he was reading in the newspaper – and the old witch Marchbanks was certainly a formidable person – but he needed independent confirmation. The trial sounded almost too good to be true: innocents getting to speak, Ministry garbage aired in public view.

Harry wanted to find out if things were as rosy at the trials as they were portrayed in the newspaper. He made himself a note to pay Alastor Moody a visit in the near future.

It should be fun going up against the paranoid old man… At least he didn't possess his magical eye in this timeline.

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_November 3, 1978_

The paperwork finally came through. 'Thomas Franklin' now owned the old White Estate.

As a wizard it took him only three hours to clean the place with magic. It had had none of the revolting creatures that had infested the Black Mansion…many decades or centuries of nonmagicals living there would have been enough to banish any ghouls, doxies, or boggarts which all relied upon magical energy for some part of their sustenance.

Harry had one week left on his flat in Manchester and then he would disappear from the industrial city. But having a large, but not enormous, building like the White Estate would help Harry with his plans for the future. He didn't plan to have too many active battles going forward, but he did need a place from which he could monitor the world and bring individuals for further interrogation…if things ever became complicated.

Harry planned to hide several rooms throughout the main buildings with the Fidelius Charm. He would do the same to three of the outbuildings, too. He hoped never to need to use the hidden rooms, but he wasn't silly enough to realize the world would fall into line this easily.

His hardest task was over…but now came the unrewarding phase, guarding over the world. Harry figured if he allowed his younger self to make it out of Hogwarts at age seventeen without the world exploding, then the young man would have the best possible kind of beginning. He could make his own choices – and, at that point, Harry would consider his task complete. Then he could choose to do other things.

Late on his first evening in residence, Harry found himself back inside the ritual chamber on the third floor. He began to read the volumes contained there. He didn't even realize he'd spent the entire night in intense concentration.

One book of rituals utterly fascinated Harry Potter. _Powerfull Rituals of Bloode Adoption_.

He wondered why he was so mesmerized by this book in particular. Nothing in his conscious mind could account for it.

Was the book charmed or cursed in some way?

Harry didn't know. He read for the rest of the day until he'd finished the entire massive volume.

Ideas danced in Harry's head, just outside of his conscious mind.

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_December 7, 1978_

Harry was severely annoyed by the lack of progress in Britain. The Death Eaters had mostly been rounded up in Britain and what seemed like the worst offenders inside the Ministry had been, at the very least, fired.

But that hadn't begun any kind of healing or reconciliation process.

Could no one think of the big picture? Could no one envision a better society?

Harry sat down to write. He'd send an article into his usual contacts at Ireland's main newspaper: _The Magical Defender_.

_**Britain at a Crossroads**_

_The question for our magical friends in Britain is: what will they do _now_ to stop the next Dark Lord from rising in thirty years?_

_If they allow the recent wounds of the last war to fester, there will certainly be another would-be conqueror to deal with in a few decades, just as Voldemort followed on from Grindelwald who emulated the Dark Baron Erskvine, in the late 1890s, who was actually apprenticed to the Black Prince of the Crimea in the 1860s._

_What are the problems the British face? Some families want stability at any cost and will support the Ministry whenever a dark voice rises up. Other families wish to reclaim what they consider to be their heritage, the various forms of the Dark Arts. Other individuals merely fester and stew over the wrongs done to them in the past by 'enemies of the family.' There are a number of almost legendary private vendettas at work even today – like the one between the Bagshots and the Flints, the Weasleys and the extinct Malfoy line, or the one that caused both the Rockwall and Fennyfern families to become extinct five years ago. _

_The wizarding world isn't large enough to support the volume and intensity of feuds we have been maintaining in the last century. So, how does the small group of British witches and wizards begin to remedy the problem?_

_Put an end to the private feuds by having all participants, official or otherwise, in the last war testify at a public Truth Commission. Empower the commission to grant amnesty to anyone who testifies (who is not guilty of committing murder, torture, or other atrocities). Ensure all convicted criminals testify under veritaserum as part of their sentences. Don't let the happenings of the war fester in people's minds: bring out all the stories, from all the sides. Perhaps that which divides the various sides isn't all that insurmountable…but they will not know unless they have all the facts._

_Give the Dark families of Britain and Europe some of what they seek. Look at the so-called Dark Arts in a more logical, sensible fashion. Establish a definition: in the fourteenth century, Rybald the Wise put forth the notion that 'the Dark Artes be those which mar men's souls.' Perhaps it no longer applies as a criterion, but the current Ministry ban stretched from the Mind Arts to Blood and Death Rituals and includes everything in between. That certainly isn't sensible either. Not all offensive spells are dark; not all rituals (though banned) cause damage to 'men's souls.' _

_There are, at present, a number of fruitful areas of magic that are outright prohibited from study because of little more than fear. Allow people to openly practice the Mind Arts; permit books on the subject to be purchased, studied, and taught. Re-evaluate the ban on potions that rely upon _willingly given _human blood: from a survey of extant books, there are cures for a number of diseases and mental disorders among this class of potions. Reopen the study of rituals: some of them are useful in calming and pacifying angry spirits, in permitting trapped ghosts to pass on to the next plane of existence, or in protecting very young children from harms magical and physical. Permit offensive magics to be taught in our schools; require all students to learn magical dueling. As they are increasingly afraid of the Dark, they risk losing the proud heritage of being skilled fighters._

_You may ask if it is not odd and contradictory to say that the British must teach students to fight if they wish to prevent wizarding wars in the future. It is not. Dark lords evolve out of fear and ignorance of things that are poorly understood. If all students learn offensive _and_ defensive magic, the allure to follow someone who promises to teach these currently illegal magics will lessen. If they reintegrate many of the improperly designated Dark Arts into society, much of the old mantra used by Voldemort and others will have less power._

_At the same time, they must open their eyes and reduce their complacency. This will help to ensure the stability that a number of families seek and desire from the Ministry of Magic. Witches and wizards are strong individuals; if they are wronged without avenues for redress, they will turn to powerful, even self-destructing magics to achieve their aims. People who can have their problems fixed through the government simply and without corruption will usually choose to do that; people who must fight the bureaucracy or pay bribes to be heard may turn to other means of affecting change, such as intimidation, violence, or outright revolt and open warfare. How they make themselves more accountable, more open to the needs of those with silenced voices, is something for public debate. But it is not something they can all ignore as if they were Crouches, Fudges, and Bagnolds._

_The war is over. It is now time to get to work preventing the next one._

Harry thought the article rushed and short, but it would do to help start the world on its path. He would follow up with other articles for other news providers on the same idea. He would slowly unwind a number of suggestions people might choose to follow.

Harry couldn't force the world to be a better place, but he could show them a possible path or two. He could try to push them along a time or three. But if they didn't want it, Harry couldn't make it happen.

There was so much wrong, Harry wondered if the real leaders were just scared to even start somewhere. He hoped someone would steal a few ideas from his article and just get started doing something.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_January 7, 1979_

Alastor Moody lived in a Muggle neighborhood outside Bristol. The house was a ramshackle building that was rumored to be haunted and that the Muggle neighbors demanded be torn down.

He used very light wards around the property, primarily to scare away any curious schoolchildren intent on exploring the 'haunted' house. At the perimeter of the house, Alastor used the full package of wards, as strong as Harry could remember seeing on a residential property.

This was the third night Harry had spent attempting to determine the weaknesses in the wards. The problem was that there weren't any. Harry could bring them all down, no problem, just throw magic at them. It would be big and splashy and utterly obvious. But he couldn't slip past them and surprise old Moody, the now confirmed Head Auror.

Harry wanted information, not attention.

He changed his plan and decided to pull a trick he knew had worked in the future. He deliberately tripped some of the wards near Moody's garbage cans and set the things to bashing each other. Sure enough, within moments, Moody was out in his yard casting spells at his misbehaving objects. Barty Crouch Junior had pulled the same trick before Harry's fourth year at Hogwarts…

Why hadn't Harry thought of his earlier? Don't try to get into defenses like Moody had; get Moody to step out of them.

Harry quickly stunned the old Auror and then dispelled the enchantment on the garbage cans. He separated Moody from his two wands and hip flask (one could only guess what the man actually kept in there). The man was in his nightcloak, otherwise he probably would have had a portkey or three on him.

Harry grasped the man's shoulder and apparated him away. He used the same cottage where he had taken Lucius Malfoy for questioning…what seemed years ago.

Harry carefully disguised himself. He didn't know if the Auror had done anything to himself to increase his resistance to Memory Charms, but Harry didn't want to give the Auror clues in any case.

He placed a strong dose of Veritaserum inside the man's mouth – six drops – and then woke him.

"Auror Moody, how many Aurors have been convicted of crimes and sent to Azkaban in the last year?"

The gruff man had glassy eyes and let the potion overpower his resistance. "Forty."

"How do you feel about them?"

"Angry. Revolted. Betrayed."

Harry nodded. "How many Aurors were fired for any reason in the last year?"

"Sixteen."

"How many Ministry officials who aren't Aurors are you investigating today?"

The man sounded feral, even through the truth potion, when he answer, "One hundred seven…"

That had Harry almost in shock. He hadn't realized that the Death Eaters had had so much support…or was it a catch all for various witchhunts?

"How many of them are suspected of being Death Eater sympathizers?"

"Seventy or so." That was a jaw dropping number. Harry had only heard Rookwood and Lestrange discuss four names. Could there really be that many?

"And the rest?"

"They did work for the Death Eaters under the Imperius Curse. We're restoring memories and trying to piece together who did what to whom…"

Harry nodded. He assumed Arthur Weasley would be horrified when he learned of his unwilling assistance identifying muggleborn witches and wizards to the Death Eaters.

"When is Barty Crouch to be tried?"

"He already was."

"I didn't read the transcript in the paper."

"The Minister invoked a secrecy statute as Crouch was a Department Head. The Wizengamot convicted him. He'll never be returning from Azkaban."

"How long ago was this?"

"Three months."

"And no notice will be published?"

"The Minister is dead set against it. His words: 'With the disaster in the Auror ranks, I can't see how the news of Barty's fate would help anyone at this point.'"

Harry was unhappy with this revelation, but not terribly surprised. The Minister was presiding over a broken ship of state and he was trying to use secrecy to improve his image…

The man definitely had to go.

"How many Death Eaters had been sent to Azkaban without trial?"

"Once we went and looked, we found seven people there who'd never been tried. Five had the Dark Mark…"

Harry continued asking about the Ministry until he was satisfied he understood the situation. Then his questions turned to Albus Dumbledore.

"Why did you join the Order of the Phoenix?"

"I joined when Arbitrus Fortesque headed the DMLE. He was a nice enough man, but he couldn't wrap his head around dealing with Death Eaters. He should have stepped down, but didn't. I went looking for a better option…"

"Wasn't the Order the same as the DMLE?"

"No, not at all. We responded before the Aurors many times. We brought down Death Eaters. Albus had long talked of getting ourselves a spy or two among them, but it never happened. We did the best we could. We did more than the Ministry did, even after Crouch took over…"

"Why was Barty Crouch so empowered and respected? It seemed like he was a lock on the next Ministerial election…"

"Cult of personality. He _seemed_ like he was doing a good job, people wanted it to be true. So the newspapers made it true, giving the man more power…until they brought him back down to earth after his son was found on a pike."

Harry never felt more reassured about his plan to remain perpetually in the shadows in this timeline. He wouldn't have wanted to be back in the headlines again…it would have done little or nothing to teach these morons self-sufficiency.

"How is the idea of a Truth Commission playing out in the Ministry?"

"Most everyone, the Minister especially, hates it. But no one seems able to stop it. The people want to know what happened, when, and why. I think the Minister may try to scuttle it by naming incompetents to the panel…"

Harry nodded. It made sense. Helfgott would protect his own legacy by obscuring the past, hiding the truth.

The questions continued on long into the night. When Moody woke up the next morning on the lawn of his home, he remembered only those damned enchanted garbage cans. Evidently some prankster had charmed them to attack Moody, as he had a lump on his forehead and a can of garbage lying next to him, its contents scattered everywhere.

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_April 12, 1979_

Harry watched Dumbledore's attempts to restore his own luster with a good deal of interest. He'd offered his own name as a Truth Commissioner, which had been quietly rejected. He'd offered six pieces of legislation, none of which received a hearing.

His newest attempts in the Wizengamot were detailed in the _Daily Prophet_, which was also feeling considerable public pressure. Harry's book on the Prophet's antics had been followed by three others focusing on different aspects of what they'd done. The paper had ignored all four books, but each one had received extensive international coverage.

The Prophet was attempting to restore some luster by bringing Dumbledore down a few pegs.

_Disgraced Former Chief Warlock Fails to Stall Truth Commission_

_Albus Dumbledore, former leader of the Wizengamot, age 98, introduced a bill yesterday to set the starting date of the Truth Commission to 'no earlier than February 1, 1980.' The bill received no seconding motion to be read and was not considered by the full Wizengamot._

_In his offering remarks, Dumbledore said, "The truth is a powerful thing, but we must all be prepared to face it. I suspect that this Truth Commission would do far more harm than good if it began this summer as the current proposal indicates. I want to ensure that the witches and wizards of Britain are braced for such turbulence…"_

_This reporter finds Dumbledore's remarks on 'the truth' rather ludicrous given his own personal revelations of recent memory. This action played to the other Elders of the Wizengamot as a naked attempt to avoid being called to account in a public forum._

_This reporter relishes the day she can listen to what Albus Dumbledore has to say about his role in the war. My quill will be especially sharp that day…_

Harry wondered if the unsigned piece had been written by one Rita Skeeter. Probably so.

"I've let this go on for a long time… I wonder…" Harry ate his breakfast while pondering the ritual he had used on Dumbledore's portrait, labeling the old man an 'enemy betrayer' of the Potter Family.

"It worked then to great effect. Had he been alive, his very magic would have torn at him until he publicly admitted his treachery. Just telling the truth to the public would have ended the torment. But, dead, with no public to hear the confession and absolve the crime, the magic tied to his soul would just keep attacking.

"Using the curse now could be a simple way to deal with him… Let the curse torment him into revealing the whole and unvarnished truth. He'd have to publicly own up to everything the books have said. He's never admitted anything publicly. It would be best if he was forced to show his true face… Even his handful of loyalists would have to abandon him."

Harry worked through the logistics. And the further he thought about the problem, the more desirable _and_ impossible this particular solution became.

"He's not done anything to the Potter Family in this timeline, has he? No Fidelius to fail. No enabling Peter Pettigrew to betray anyone. No baby Harry dumped on a doorstep. No child-friendly gauntlet for the Philosopher's Stone. No arranging for the TriWizard Tournament to come to Hogwarts. He's clean from the Potter Family perspective, but what about other families?"

Harry nodded and began to trace down the pathways of who might be eligible and what he knew about those families.

"It's not perfect. He never wronged anyone in the old timeline as much as the Potters… It'll have to be something else, won't it?"

He gave up the half formed planned. He'd find another way.

He finished his breakfast and continued reading the newspaper. In the back, he saw the rather tedious legal notifications. One caught his eye. "Ministry of Magic announces Ministerial elections to be held December 15, 1979. All NEWT-qualified witches and wizards over the age of thirty may campaign in the race starting on May 1, 1979…"

That made Harry quite happy. Reynaldo Helfgott was a moron. He was likely to be extremely unpopular – even more than he currently was – after the Truth Commission.

Perhaps a powerful witch or wizard in the Minister's role could deal with Dumbledore… But who?

Who?

Harry smiled. He wondered if he might be able to draft his grandfather, Harris Potter, for the role. Light oriented, wealthy and thereby fairly incorruptible, with a well known position on the Death Eaters and their ideological supporters.

It was an interesting idea.

_Harris Potter for Minister._

_Draft Harris Potter._

_Put a Potter in the Minister's Office._

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_May 6, 1979_

Harry had purchased a pair of Muggle binoculars for the special occasion. (Omnioculars hadn't been invented yet, it seemed.)

From a few hundred yards away, Harry Potter was watching his parents' wedding reception. They were at the newly rebuilt Potter Manor. The charmed satchels of belongings, portraits, and books had been restored into a building that looked old but felt more welcoming than the earlier Potter Manor.

He watched James and Lily Potter dancing. He caught sight of Sirius Black charming three different witches at various points during the afternoon. He saw Remus politely dance with a few older witches and then decline a few invitations from some younger ones; the poor man seemed to already be withdrawing from the world…

Alastor Moody was there and he even danced with Minerva McGonagall. An ancient Bathilda Bagshot was present and she was leaning into Xenophilius Lovegood lecturing him on some topic at what was probably the top of her voice; _The Quibbler_ hadn't come into existence yet, but many of Xeno's stranger ideas likely had.

Harry spotted the present Minister gobbling up some treacle tarts. Reynaldo Helfgott looked like a cross between a constipated mule and a devious, feral dog who was deciding whether to beg for scraps or bite the hand of anyone who came close to him. He really shouldn't be allowed to reproduce, let alone lead a country.

Harris Potter and his wife Eloise were telling some kind of amusing story to a group of younger people arrayed near them. They looked above school age, but rather fit compared to other adults. Some of James' Quidditch colleagues, perhaps?

Bottle after bottle of goblin and elvin wine were poured; hundreds of tiny tarts and savoury foods of all varieties were paraded around on trays or left at the serving table. It was the party of the year, as lavish as any post-Voldemort celebration had been (Harry was going off the published reports for the other parties).

He used his binoculars to survey everything. He saw the mound of presents that the guests had brought along and the tiny elf who accepted each one and put it safely onto a table. He saw three people apparate outside the wards and walk inside to the party. None of them stopped by the gift table.

The gut instinct Harry had been born with suggested there was something odd about these people: three women, bearing no gifts, coming late to a party. Was it a group of Death Eaters under Polyjuice? Was it someone aiming to assassinate the Minister as he stuffed his gullet? A group of reporters attempting to sneak in?

Harry trained his binoculars on the faces of each of the three. One was quite ancient. One was perhaps forty, but poorly maintained. One had a vacant expression and had hair like a bird's nest and about seven different colored shawls draped over her body…

Harry looked at the youngest one's face again. Trelawney, pre-Sherry-bottle hiding in the Room of Requirement. Trelawney who wasn't yet a lush. Trelawney who wouldn't condemn his parents to their deaths… He had hoped never to see the woman again.

He kept his binoculars trained on her and her odd companions as they avoided the people at the party, didn't introduce themselves to the Potters, and stuck mainly to the places where the elves opened bottles of wine and brought out freshly baked treats.

He was so focused on the strange lady – content just to sip a dark wine, stain her teeth purple, and eat tiny liver canapés – that he almost missed the entrance of Peter Pettigrew to the area surrounding the food.

The heavy set little man didn't even notice when he stumbled over one of Trelawney's shawls. But Harry finally did.

It made him nervous. Trelawney: the whisperer of Fate. Pettigrew: the agent of Fate and a bastard to boot. Harry had basically forgotten about both of them.

But no longer. He'd set up something to observe Sybil Trelawney's mutterings to see if she ever did speak a true prophecy. He'd also have to arrange something for Wormtail; he had been a traitor in the first timeline and it was obvious he would twist in the wind at the first sign of trouble this time, too. If Harry's grandparents, parents, and godfather had a fundamental flaw, it was that they were too trusting and too unwilling to see the dark that could pollute and mar their putative friends.

Harry didn't have the problem of trusting too easily.

He would never again let Pettigrew slip away as an unmemorable little lump. He was dangerous and would always be dangerous.

Unfortunately for Peter, Harry was even more dangerous.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_July 1, 1979_

Harry loved the smell of the early morning in Diagon Alley. This was the fourth time he'd come here since he'd returned in time. There was now a bakery next to the Quidditch store that produced a wonderful fragrance over the entire Alley.

Harry munched on a freshly baked cauldron cake – pumpkin and chocolate – as he walked down to the public square just beyond Gringotts.

The inaugural meeting of the Truth Commission was meeting outside, in full view of Diagon Alley, as some kind of metaphor for the openness they hope to bring to Britain.

Harry was attending out of interest…and to see how successful various factions in the Ministry had been in filling the body with obstructionists and morons. He hoped that the British could solve some of their problems by themselves. Then again…so long as a corrupt Ministry didn't impinge on the as-yet-unborn Harry Potter's ability to live a good life, he would be inclined to let them be.

If pigs wanted to live in squalor and discord, who was Harry to preach at them?

Harry looked like a wizened old man, gray and white locks hanging halfway down his back. He was wearing clean, somber robes and holding a somewhat garish painted staff.

Harry surveyed the street and noticed that the Truth Commission had taken an office on Diagon Alley, above one of the restaurants, rather than one inside the Ministry of Magic. Who knew? It might be worth something.

A few minutes after Harry arrived, a small witch stepped out onto the street. She conjured up a long table and then a chair for herself to sit in. Over the next five minutes, six other individuals arrived at the table, conjured their own chairs, and sat down.

Finally, a contingent of Aurors surrounding the Minister and a few other officials arrived.

The small witch then stood up and addressed the audience of about seventy witches and wizards, a fairly small turnout.

"Good morning. I am Griselda Marchbanks, Elder of the Wizengamot and recently retired Chief Witch, and I have been asked to chair the Truth Commission. I will introduce the other members and then we will proceed to the day's business: testing and questioning each of the Truth Commission members for any involvement we might have had in the just-ended war."

Harry was impressed. He hadn't expected the commission members to subject themselves to this kind of precaution. He felt a bit better about the whole exercise. 'Perhaps this Marchbanks was strong enough to keep the Ministry from interfering…"

"We have two other Wizengamot Elders, Vernon Quirke and Baris Entwhistle. We have invited two foreign members, retired Belgian Justice Underminister Eric Coopman and retired Spanish Chief Justice Diego Tapias. Also, we have appointed two members of the general public to serve, Sorcha McGoohan and Galway Keating. The officials from the Ministry of Magic are here only to administer the Veritaserum to each of us and to observe the proceedings…"

Harry thought the old woman – one of his OWL examiners in his first timeline – was exceedingly crafty in how she was approaching the situation. Distancing herself from the Ministry…offering up herself to public scrutiny…trying to make the whole thing work by having the majority of members unaffiliated with the British government…having no representatives from the Ministry bureaucracy itself.

The Ministry representatives administered the veritaserum and then stood back as Madam Marchbanks was questioned, publicly, to kick off the Truth Commission.

"Identify yourself, madam." The representative from Spain kicked off the questioning.

"Griselda Marchbanks."

"Your age?"

This got a couple chuckles from the audience. It wasn't exactly proper to ask a matron such questions…but it would prove that the veritaserum was working.

"One hundred seven years old."

"Have you ever supported the one called Voldemort?"

"No."

"Did you ever support any Death Eater in any way?"

"I was asked to be Barty Crouch Junior's godmother, but I had to decline."

The crowd seemed amused by the admission.

"Why did you decline?" The Spanish representative had a good sense of the questions people wanted answered.

"Because I couldn't stand Barty's wife…"

That had the audience laughing. Griselda was blushing as the woman she'd just badmouthed was still alive…and quite ill.

"When did you become aware of irregularities with how the Aurors were prosecuting the war?"

"When I read the accounts in the Irish newspapers…and that interesting series the Americans did. The _Daily Prophet_ took quite a while to start investigating…"

"Yes, the Spanish papers had the stories a few days before you did here. Do you represent the interests of any individual or group of individuals who work for the Ministry of Magic?"

"Definitely not. I have served for thirty-eight years on the Wizengamot since my husband died. I've always served without listening to the lobbyists, the Malfoys, and the sycophants the Minister has around him. I'll do the same thing here."

Half the audience was laughing again. The Minister and his supporters looked a cross between anger and embarrassment.

;

"Why did you join the Truth Commission?"

"I would like to know what happened in the war. I've heard so many horrifying stories from both sides. I know I'm not the only one who wants to know. But I've got the time and the sheer stubbornness to see it through."

Even Harry Potter had to smile at that. She did seem thoroughly 'stubborn' in the best sense of the word.

"Do you have any ulterior motives?"

"To make my country great again. We need to get over and through this…and not keep the anger. I don't know if the Commission will do much, but it's the best idea I've heard in some time to help set things right."

Harry listened to the rest of the questions. He stayed to hear Madam Marchbanks come out of the Veritaserum and scowl at her inquisitor. Then she began questioning the others. They all sounded neutral…and interested in the truth of what had occurred during the war.

This really could work, Harry thought.

He hadn't felt hopeful in quite some time, but he did that morning. He was surrounded by government functionaries, public gadflies, drunkards who had nothing better to do than to gather and listen, and assorted others – but he still felt like the world was about to change for the better.

Optimism for Harry was a rare emotion. In this particular case, it was a bit misplaced as well. The law of balance hadn't yet reared its ugly head, but it would. Harry's efforts had been too easy thus far, so Fate decided upon some unforeseen changes.


	6. The Next Potter Generation

**Chapter 6: The Next Potter Generation**

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_August 17, 1979_

In contrast to the light attendance of the inaugural session of the Truth Commission, this meeting was packed. The Commission had arranged to use the Diagon Alley Hall on the days when it had particular prominent people to question. The hall had been near to full when Orion and Walburga Black had been called to testify.

This day, the Hall was overflowing.

Albus Dumbledore would be testifying, under duress and the effects of Veritaserum. The audience was even willing to sit through the thirty minutes he'd been allotted for a public statement before the questions began.

The witches and wizards were expecting blood – and secrets revealed – and the downfall of a revered man.

Harry thought the whole thing a bit sad.

The old wizard entered the room and took a seat. The entire hall fell into silence. Then the seven members of the Truth Commission took their chairs. The old witch Marchbanks nodded at Dumbledore who then turned around and began to speak directly to the assembled audience. Very odd.

"I must thank the Commission for this unusual opportunity to present a statement prior to my sworn testimony. I would like to clarify a few issues that are likely to be central in the question. As has been widely reported, I led until recently a group called the Order of the Phoenix to collect intelligence and act against Death Eaters throughout the country. Following the demise of Voldemort, the group broke up…"

That was the point when Harry knew that Dumbledore was going to try to lie to everyone. The group hadn't exactly 'broken up,' it had crumbled under the weight of the allegations against Dumbledore. The man would try to couch and massage the truth. Would anyone catch him publicly?

"…my role as Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot has also come into question. I assumed the role approximately at the same time I became Headmaster of Hogwarts, in 1970. I did vote to confirm Bartemius Crouch as Head of the DMLE and I did approve many of his department's requests concerning the disposition of orphaned children and heir-less estates. I regret those decisions…"

Harry frowned. The old man regretted only that he'd been caught.

"…I wish, for the sake of all those he injured, that I had chosen differently, that Barty had chosen differently. I knew nothing about the doctoring of reports happening within his department nor had I heard about his Aurors' practice of killing the wounded at battle scenes…"

That Harry did believe. That sole fact probably angered Dumbledore more than any other concerning what Crouch had done: Dumbledore would have wanted them alive, indefinitely, in order to 'rehabilitate' them.

"…the Phoenix, the members of the group have all consented to testify before the Commission in the coming weeks and months. I have already spoken personally with every member to ensure that we committed no atrocities. I feel confident that the testimony will prove this out. It will also prove that, even with Mr. Crouch's aggressive stance on combating Death Eaters, we were first on scene more than twice as often as the Aurors were. I hope to be able to discuss at greater length my very deep concerns about the _how's_ and _why's_ of this continuously delayed response. No doubt it cost many lives and the destruction of much property…"

The old man had gone from being defensive to sounding like a politician again, trumpeting his own accomplishments, stumping for votes in an imaginary election. He was using the Aurors as his practice dummy. He was actually lecturing _them_ when he was being called to account for his own misdeeds. Dumbledore really had planned this out: start deflecting attention from himself within the first five minutes. Masterful and sickening.

Harry only hoped that Marchbanks and the others wouldn't fall for it.

"…as for the distant past of the Dumbledore family, I assure everyone that it has no bearing on the present discussion of the recently ended war. I have received assurance that today's questions will not touch on these painful topics that have lately become of much speculative interest…"

Harry thought that Dumbledore was just putting off the inevitable conversation about his sister and that disastrous meeting between Albus, Aberforth, and Gellert that resulted in the death of an already damaged child. He would have to answer some of these questions eventually. Perhaps not at this Commission meeting, but eventually.

"I welcome the Commission's questions. Madam Marchbanks?" Dumbledore turned around again and sat down.

The old witch nodded at Dumbledore and a Ministry representative appeared on stage and doused the old wizard.

Old Madam Marchbanks didn't bother to use any embarrassing questions to verify if the Veritaserum was working. "Mister Dumbledore, how well did you know Bartemius Crouch prior to his appointment to lead the DMLE?"

"He'd been a Lead Auror and headed up a brigade of Aurors for more than ten years. I had seen his performance while acting as a member of the Wizengamot for trials in which he participated and then had little more to do with him until his appointment."

"And did you conduct any research into his views or likely methods?"

"Yes."

"Describe the research you did."

Harry smiled. The old witch was starting with a bit of conversation Dumbledore hadn't yet seen exposed to the general public, a bit of conversation that Alastor Moody didn't even remember because of Dumbledore's obliviation of the grizzled Auror. From what Harry had seen in other meetings, Marchbanks normally didn't dig down into details until she had established the preliminaries, but Dumbledore's statement had done much of that. She intended to have a showy beginning…and to falsify some of Dumbledore's statement and blacken his image from the start.

"I asked other Aurors about Mr. Crouch. I asked some of the Wizengamot members who'd presided over cases he'd been involved in. At the time, the information I received painted Mr. Crouch in a very favorable light…"

"How about commissioning any research into Mr. Crouch's likely opponents?"

"I did not commission research of that sort…"

Harry kept his smile to himself. Dumbledore had just fallen into a trap. Harry had been sufficiently disturbed by the memories he'd stolen from Dumbledore's pensieve that he'd turned many of them into articles to be published in Ireland. The first article would cover exactly the conversation where Dumbledore and Moody discussed Mr. Crouch – and what had been done to ensure he rose to head the DMLE.

"Did you commission someone else to commission research into the candidates for the DMLE?" The question was worded perfectly.

"Yes." Veritaserum, used on powerful mind, could be resisted with weak and ambiguous questions. It worked better and better the more specific and damning the question.

Madam Marchbanks smiled up on the stage. It was visible in the audience. She was unraveling his word games and the little bits of misdirection Dumbledore could plant even under Veritaserum. She was doing it in public.

"Did you have one of your associates of the time, the current Head Auror Alastor Moody, place incriminating evidence concerning Crouch's predecessor and the other likely candidates?"

Dumbledore paled and it was obvious he was now trying to fight the drug. "How did you…"

By that answer alone, it was obvious that Dumbledore had done _something_.

"I received an advanced copy of an interesting article slated to appear tomorrow in an Irish newspaper called the _Magical Defender_. Apparently they're reporting you had Mister Moody do these things for you…and then you obliviated him of the knowledge."

Dumbledore sat almost choking in surprise.

"It is true," he finally admitted. "He did the work, but wasn't happy about it… I removed his memories to prevent complications later on."

"Guilty conscience type complications?"

"Among others, yes."

"Why did you believe Barty Crouch was the right person for the job?"

"He wasn't scared, at first, to say Voldemort's name. He had the right idea on tactics…"

The room fell silent at that admission. Dumbledore had picked Crouch because of the things Crouch would permit the Aurors to do? The man had just leapt off the Astronomy Tower under his own words…

"…and he would make sure Voldemort didn't win."

"And what gave you the right to interfere in the process to ensure Crouch's election?"

"I am the most powerful magic user in Britain. Of course it was my right."

The Hall fell silent for nearly a minute before Madam Marchbanks recovered her wits. She'd apparently never expected Dumbledore to say such a thing. It was, frankly, the kind of thing a Dark Lord would say. In polite company, everyone knew of Dumbledore's magical power, but no one spoke of it or the rationale behind his position of Headmaster of Hogwarts or the others he'd assembled and later lost.

"Mr. Dumbledore," Marchbanks eventually said. "No one likes to believe that they don't live in a democratic world. But you're suggesting might makes power, not votes…"

"That is correct." A shudder rippled through the audience again.

"If you're so powerful, sir, why weren't you the one to kill Voldemort? You dueled him a half dozen times according to official records…"

"I tried, Madam. I tried but I could not fell him."

"Perhaps there is more hype than power in your actual self, Mr. Dumbledore…"

Harry stayed only another twenty minutes. The questions got harder and harder on Dumbledore and he appeared a massive fool. Harry only imagined the entire situation got worse as the hours drug on.

Harry wondered about tomorrow's _Daily Prophet_ headline: "Dumbledore the Dictator" or "The Puppeteer Emerges" or "Merlin's Memories: Might Dumbledore Have Erased Those Too?"

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_October 3, 1979_

Harry breakfasted lightly while he read the _Daily Prophet_. His anonymous salvo into the new war to clean up the Ministry was located on page 11. It was small and easily bypassed.

He read the small advertisement and wondered who else might find it interesting?

_Draft Harris Potter for Minister_

_He hasn't declared his intentions to run for public office, but the public needs him nonetheless. He has served in the Wizengamot off and on for forty-seven years and has a compendious understanding of the affairs of government. He's among the wealthiest wizards of our time and is incorruptible. He hasn't always sides with the Light (he voted against Dumbledore's ascension to Chief Warlock) and doesn't outright dismiss the Dark. He's firmly in the middle…an intelligent man's choice._

_We need to convince Harris Potter to run for Minister of Magic. He is our best hope of reunifying our broken world._

It was appropriately bombastic. Harry wondered which set of witches and wizards would glom onto the idea and run with it… Harris Potter would be a candidate, whether he wanted it or not, by the end of the month.

His poor grandfather. Instead of retirement, the man would be the busiest man in the country for the foreseeable future.

Harry did not doubt that the pale announced crop of Proudfoot, Kaleman, Spinnet, and Greengrass would fall by the way. Potter would surely win on the first balloting, even if he protested he didn't _really_ want the job. Witches and wizards had a definite problem respecting each other's privacy.

Harry folded the paper and then vanished it.

He walked upstairs to the little room he'd set up on the second floor. It was where he fabricated the magical devices he'd need. He finally recreated omnioculars for his personal use…and he'd created quite an unusual necklace there too.

Today he walked over to the recording crystal that was tied to that necklace, a shiny bauble that had basically compelled Sybil Trelawney to wear it and never take it off once she'd found it. (The ramshackle old building inhabited by the Trelawneys had been very easy to enter.)

Harry made it a point to listen to the crystal every few days to see if Trelawney had said anything interesting – or anything at all. The mad woman could spend entire days playing with prophetic cards or rolling chicken bones around in a cup or staring at a lump of glass that had no relation whatsoever to the ethereal plane. She knew she had no gift for prophesy, yet she still spent hours and entire days trying to bring out 'her Inner Eye.'

The entire project took only twenty minutes. The crystal only noted the things she'd said…and most of her conversations had been about haddock and the salad she didn't want to eat for lunch.

The only knew thing Harry learned was that Sybil's mother was quite inventive when it came to curse words…and that she was absolutely convinced that Sybil did have the gift of Sight. 'You're just holding back, dearie. You can't be lazy or you'll never be gifted with their Favor…'

Harry didn't agree with the old woman, but he couldn't afford to be wrong, either. Sybil hadn't said or done anything at the time indicated in the old timeline. Not a whisper. But Harry would keep monitoring the old fraud…

Fate would just love to play another trick on him.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_November 11, 1979_

Today had been an 'important' day on the old timeline. The day that Petunia got married to Vernon Dursley in a dress that showed she was expecting. She was such a small woman and the child she was carrying would be such a large newborn…it was no wonder she had been the immediate victim of gossip leading up to this hastily arranged 'blessed event.'

Harry walked down Privet Drive where Vernon and his still living parents had just arranged for a small home at Number 4. It was as beastly now as it had been when Harry had lived here. The sameness, the uniformity.

Vernon and Petunia would be leaving for their honeymoon in the Cotswolds in a few hours. Vernon had only been inside the house a single time; Petunia had yet to see it. Harry walked, disillusioned, through to the backyard and unlocked the back door. He set foot inside the recently built home, one he hadn't seen since his hasty, disastrous abandonment of the home just prior to his seventeenth birthday.

Harry hated the place.

He walked over to the cupboard under the stairs. He sealed the wood of the door into the wood of the frame surrounding it. Vernon or any future owners would have to physically cut into the wood to restore this tiny bit of space.

Harry wouldn't let this bit of his history be turned into a mere home for vacuum cleaners and scouring products. It would remain a mystery that Vernon and Petunia would never figure out.

As he walked through the rest of the house, even the basement, Harry decided on what he would do. He would cast a magic detection charm on something innocuous in the house: it would alert Harry in the event that Vernon and Petunia kept having children and one of them turned out magical. He also decided to cast a calming ward across the house and lawn.

To Harry, the house had always felt tense and strained. It had been filled with anger, bullying, and cutting words. Harry wondered if even a calming influence would keep Vernon from being a vicious sort of human; if it would keep Dudley from being spoiled and about as worthless as they came (even with his rather pathetic apology just prior to Harry's 17th birthday).

He set to work on the house and was finished in twenty minutes. He was giving the Dursley family only one opportunity…if they ever crossed his path for harming a magical child or for ever saying the word 'freak' in his presence, they would have mysterious heart attacks in the night. Heart attacks the Muggles would attribute to stress and unhealthy eating habits.

But he was willing to give them this single chance.

Harry walked out of the backyard, relocking the door as he went. He continued down the path and eventually cut over to Wisteria Walk, where Arabella Figg had lived. Right now the house sat unfinished, waiting for windows to be installed. Given the weather, it was rather late in the year still to be constructing housing…

Then again, Harry wasn't a muggle construction manager. What did he know?

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

_December 14, 1979_

Strange to say, but Harry Potter's favorite bar was the Busted Bucket in Godric's Hollow. It was located on a small strip of mostly magical businesses that used light repelling wards to protect themselves. Muggles could see the Busted Bucket, but none ever had the inclination to come to this bar. The occasional batty human who resisted the wards forgot about the bar entirely when they hit the second level of wards just at the door. The whole thing worked out just fine.

Harry slipped inside because he wanted to listen to the Wizarding Wireless coverage of the last Truth Commission hearing of the year. He wanted to get a read of average folks, which is why he hadn't attended the session in person.

He took his favorite stool at the bar. "Gillywater, please."

He looked like an old, darkly tanned wizard. The bartender didn't pay him a second glass after he set the drink on the bar.

"Much obliged."

Harry set two sickles down, which was the price of the drink and a hefty tip included. He'd just intentionally marked himself as a wizard with means. He'd get good service here for the rest of his visit.

He then walked over toward the Wizarding Wireless. He wanted to be close by to get all the details. He took a seat in a booth with a good view of the rest of the room. There were quite a few folks already in attendance.

The music from the little box cut away to silence. Then a woman's voice filled the room. "Today the Truth Commission will begin the formal voting on granting of Amnesty for crimes committed during the recently ended war. Only those who've freely testified before us are at all eligible for Amnesty. A number of open cases cannot even be decided yet until all the parties concerned are heard. However, this first list contains mostly those held under the Imperius Curse…and all of the names have corroboration from the Death Eaters in Azkaban who testified under Veritaserum."

The shuffling of papers was just loud enough to transmit over the wireless. It filled the room for a few moments before the woman began speaking again.

"Our first case will be Arthur Weasley of the Ministry's Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office…."

Harry heard a few exclamations from the bar folk. 'A good man, Arthur.' 'Poor, it's true, but he stands for his ideals.' 'Rather an odd head on that one, completely a-twittered with Muggles, you know.'

"…testimony and recovered memories suggesting that Mr. Weasley was under the Imperius Curse when he smuggled out Ministry records naming quite a few of the Muggleborn wizards in our world. Mr. Weasley freely testified on October 3 of this year. He has also sent a letter which he asked to be read into the record prior to our deliberations on his case.

"'Dear Members, I wish to thank you for allowing me to recount what little I could remember of my role in unwillingly aiding the Death Eaters. To ensure this particular type of incident doesn't happen again on my watch, I have drafted legislation to do away with taxes and records that pertain specifically to Muggleborn witches and wizards. I have also drafted a set of rules requiring anti-Imperius wards to be erected at every departmental entrance. I cannot express how deeply ashamed I am at the actions I was forced to undertake, but I can help to prepare all of us for any unscrupulous types who might attack us at our weak points in the future.

"'I write today most specifically concerning my role in the Order of the Phoenix. Since the date of my testimony I have learned a great deal of additional information concerning that body that gives me great pause. I did not learn until late November of the Order's torture-questioning and eventual killing of the Death Eater Sturgis Podmore. I did not even know he had been a double agent of the Order until the newspapers broke the account. I do not condone that sort of conduct and I cannot understand how people I once trusted resorted to those measures. Even if Podmore's questioning revealed the names of two other traitors, I think there were better ways – legal ways – of handling the situation.

"'Thank you for your attention to my concerns. I wish you the best of luck in your ponderous endeavors. May Merlin favor the brave.'"

Harry surveyed the barroom. A number of people were nodding; no one was scowling. It boded well… People could at least smell honest intentions.

The conversation on the Wizarding Wireless continued for five minutes before the voting started. All but one of the Commissioners – Sorcha McGoohan, who rejected Amnesty but declined to state why – authorized Arthur's official forgiveness for committing crimes under the Imperius Curse. The Amnesty was very specific about what was being forgiven; he could still come under charges for his role in the Order of the Phoenix.

"Next on docket for Amnesty: Albus Dumbledore's role…"

That was all the farther she got. A heavily accented voice, Spanish most likely, said, "I would like to table any Amnesty for Mr. Dumbledore until we've heard all the witnesses."

The woman took a second before responding. "We'll put it to a vote." It was unanimous for tabling the motion. Harry doubted whether a majority of the Commission would ever vote to pick the subject up again.

"Moving on, the Amnesty request for Mr. William Pickering…"

Harry tuned out the rest of the meeting. Most of the others did, too. It was a relief that Dumbledore's gambit with the Commission had failed. The old man had proclaimed in the _Prophet_ not one week ago that "I will receive forgiveness and official Amnesty for the things I've done to save our great nation."

It seemed not.

Dumbledore only had his reputation and his dwindling influence at Hogwarts. He had been kicked off the Wizengamot completely in the last three weeks for his crimes against the state. He had fought the Board of Governors to a 6 to 6 split against demanding his removal as Headmaster.

He was in his waning days of influence…even with the _Daily Prophet_ which had started in on the 'Dumbledore is a nutter' spiel a few decades early.

The positive attention the _Prophet _was dishing out was meant for Harris Potter…who had reluctantly decided he had to stand for Minister of Magic.

Harry wandered back to the bar and got a second gillywater. He left a significant tip again. Good tippers got remembered, but not in any negative respects. Harry's persona of the day would just be the quiet man who came into the bar to listen to the Wireless. He wouldn't be skulking sort who demanded extra scrutiny…

This time Harry sat down at the bar and sipped his drink.

The bartender started up the conversation. "Been following the campaigns?"

Harry smiled and nodded. "A couple of interesting folks…"

"Just glad that that Helfgott realized it was time to retire."

Harry sipped.

"I'm backing Potter, meself," the bartender said. "I'll floo down first thing to the Ministry and fill in my ballot…"

"Potter, eh? Don't know too much about the man."

"Very nice man. Owns a cottage on the other side of town. Spends a few weeks there every year, his son James was born there on one of Harri's vacations. I had him in this tavern here last spring. Bright chap and very kind. That's the best sort, you know. Too many smart folks get cruel and arrogant, you see, like You-Know-Who…"

Harry nodded.

"You think this Potter will win?"

"I'm fairly sure of it. Some anonymous soul decided to draft him into the campaign, you remember. Three of the other folks left the race after Potter officially declared. Most of the ones I chat with think Potter'll do well."

Harry raised his nearly empty glass. "Here's hoping you're right."

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_January 1, 1980_

As expected, the New Year Day's celebration in Diagon Alley was bitterly cold. But Harry couldn't stay away. He bundled up extra warmly, to the point where he barely needed any disguise at all. Only wisps of his golden were visible underneath his hat and thick cloaks. None of his skin was noticeable.

A similarly bundled man came out onto a platform that had been erected earlier this morning.

The man on the platform was Harry's grandfather, the new Minister of Magic.

He had opted for an old form of swearing in: outdoors, in front of a general audience, with none of the trappings of office, making an oath on his magic to perform to the best of his abilities. No Minister had used the 'old form' in nearly three hundred years.

There was no one else on the platform. There was no ornamentation, no decorations.

At the stroke of noon, Minister Potter lowered the hood of his cloak and addressed the crowd, "By my magic, I take up the duties of Minister of Magic. By my magic, I swear to perform my level best. By my magic, I forswear lying, deceit, and half truths. So mote it be."

No one said anything. The oath Harris Potter had just sworn was stronger than anyone had expected. He had just sworn off lying in all its forms while in office. Could anyone maintain that sort of oath? It seems Minister Potter had to, otherwise he'd lose his magic. He was an old man, about to turn 123, and the loss of his magic would surely kill him.

He'd made his service to the Ministry a life and death matter.

Harry Potter didn't know whether to be terrified for his grandfather or pleased with the man's dangerous idealism.

Harris Potter stepped off the platform and began, in a ceremonial fashion, grasping the hands of everyone who'd braved the temperature to see his inauguration. Harry got to touch his grandfather's hand for a second time ever, albeit briefly.

He walked away from the crowd as everyone else went to Floo into the Ministry. The banquet had been set up in the Atrium.

Harry hoped he'd done the right thing pushing his grandfather into office.

It had seemed the thing to do.

But Harris Potter seemed determined to ensure he died in office, probably from some minor lie he'd tell…which would strip his magic and his life from him. Brave but foolish, the epitome of Gryffindor.

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_February 12, 1980_

Harry scowled as he apparated to the scene of a crime. Three wizards who had testified last week before the Truth Commission had been killed. Their bodies had been found just inside the Forbidden Forest, nearest to Hogsmeade.

Three people all connected together because of the Truth Commission; it wasn't a coincidence. Something was brewing.

"By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes…" Harry whispered Shakespeare's words to himself. The squib from the line of Hathaway witches had been brilliant – and yet another thing Harry hadn't learned of in Binns' 'History' class. If it wasn't goblin, troll, or giant, it didn't matter to the man.

Harry was concerned that he had no idea – no timeline – to try to understand what was happening. Since Harry had killed Voldemort all his future knowledge had become worthless.

What this killing meant, Harry had no idea.

He saw the Aurors trying to collect spell residue and identify what had happened and when. They'd already been here for hours and they seemed to be completely baffled. Harry had only heard of it because of the listening charms he'd set up outside the entrance to the Ministry. Frustrated Aurors could reveal a lot without intending to.

Harry walked around disillusioned trying to spot anything probative.

After thirty minutes, he gave it up as a bad job. There wasn't anything in the woods to be found.

Dead wizards, tied to the Commission, but two of them had supported the Dark, a third had been a Ministry official who'd been an Auror in 1970 before he moved to a desk. They had nothing obvious in common. Aside from their testimony. /p>

Harry had felt so in-control when he returned into this timeline. He had documentation; dates, activities, and ideas for stopping the Death Eaters.

Now…now, Harry had nothing. He was an acrobat working without a net. No one knew the risks he was taking; Harry knew nothing of what his actions might cause to happen.

But something had just started. These three deaths were some kind of sign.

What they meant, Harry didn't know. But he felt afraid. He knew it was the beginning of something unpleasant.

Had Voldemort's reign been a mere nuisance compared to whatever was about to happen? Harry hoped he hadn't changed time just to unleash something even worse than Voldemort.

Somehow he knew that Fate still hated him.

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_March 3, 1980_

Ronald Weasley was born on March 1, 1980. According to what Harry observed, the boy was as loud and hungry as an infant as he would be later in life.

Harry was lurking around the Burrow to commit an act of premeditated murder. The first and only time he'd killed in such a manner.

Harry Potter was going to kill Ginevra Weasley before the girl was ever born.

That was why he was lurking…lurking and waiting. He'd caught sight to Molly Weasley earlier in the day. The woman had given birth two days earlier and she was back up cooking and cleaning. Of course, with a brood the size she had, she couldn't let things slip too long.

At eleven fourteen in the morning he'd had an opportunity to kill Ginny, but Molly had moved from the window.

So he'd remained…waiting.

He saw Charlie tending after the twins. Percy was off reading a too-thick book. Bill must have been at Hogwarts already, a first year perhaps?

Arthur Weasley returned to the outer edge of the wards just after five o'clock. Harry tagged the man with the infertility curse as soon as he had a clear shot.

He spent another thirty minutes waiting before he was able to slake his desire for vengeance. Molly left the house for a few moments. She was apparently trying to pluck some fresh herbs for the dinner she was preparing.

No matter. Harry took aim and unleashed the curse at the woman. He'd just ensured that a baby named Ginevra would never be born, never attend Hogwarts, never marry Harry Potter, and never betray Harry and his three children. It was awful. It was justice.

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_May 7, 1980_

The _Daily Prophet_ carried an enormous headline. "Witness Killer Located; Witch in Throes of Dementia Arrested."

Harry devoured the article and found little of value in it. The Aurors weren't commenting on who the witch was or how she'd been identified. The only new piece of information was that the woman was suspected of seven total killings, all of the victims had testified in front of the Commission.

"…but that means that four murders went unreported…"

Harry wasn't surprised at the realization. He was a bit dumbfounded that the _Prophet_ hadn't even acknowledged their lax reporting of recent weeks and months.

"Nothing's changed, has it? The newspaper is still unreliable. Minister Grandfather is so bogged down cleaning out the Ministry that the present work is falling to the wayside. At least he finally sacked Dolores Umbridge and that awful Runcorn fellow. But it's too much for any one person to accomplish…"

It might actually be better to start over from scratch.

A dangerous thought. But the longer Harry was in this timeline, the more frustrated he became. The Truth Commission was getting the truth out there, but it didn't seem to be having an effect. The dark families were still marginalized and angry. The other families still shifted in whatever direction the winds blew.

There was no war, but it seemed like nothing else had changed.

Harry could only do so much from the shadows…and he was unprepared to act in the light of day.

There wasn't anything Harry could yet do, but he also wasn't satisfied just to sit back and observe. He hadn't come here to improve the world only to watch it descend into chaos again.

The demented witch could be the guilty party, but had she become demented naturally or with some assistance. Was she part of a large movement? Was this something…

Harry's mind twirled with questions and self-recriminations. He'd thought everything would be fine. He thought he'd settled the world down. But had he done anything of utility?

Would the peace last?

Harry felt a bit silly feeling so silly, but he'd been looking for nefarious plots his whole like since the age of eleven. Even as an Auror, he'd had to deal with three nascent dark lords trying to rally support in Britain. Thankfully none had been as intelligent, as organized, or as insane as Voldemort.

He wished he had someone to talk to. The life he'd picked had been so lonely, almost impossibly so. There was no one to bounce ideas off of. No one to perform 'reality checks' to ensure he was still operating in the realm of the sane.

It was impossible to live like this…but inconceivable to do anything different at this point. He couldn't go back to the future. He'd already changed everything about that time. There would be no place for him there, just as there was no real place for him here.

He roughly shoved it all away. It didn't matter.

He had no get focused again. The future would unfold as it did. The thing that mattered was ensuring peace in the here and now…

There were obviously many more Death Eaters exposed this time around. What if some of the ones who hadn't been exposed were still operating? Or if the Death Eaters' unmarked supporters were retaliating in some way…or if the dark wizards who'd opposed Voldemort were now acting. There were many different groups to investigate.

The leisure Harry had envisioned for himself was over.

There was work to be done.

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_July 31, 1980_

It was all worth it.

All the years of waiting, watching, and trying to nudge the world back into shape.

Harry James Potter had just been born. Harry had stood outside Potter Manor when it happened. He'd heard the exclamations of joy ripple through the men-folk lounging in the backyard.

Harry apparated away.

He had gifts for baby Harry.

Since the world had begun to fall apart again, Harry paid closer attention to those who'd never been corrupted into the Death Eaters this time around. It didn't make them innocents in Harry's book…it just didn't give them opportunities to expose what they really were.

Peter Pettigrew, still a close friend to the Potters, would betray James, Lily, and Harry given half a chance. His quiet, simmering jealousy would almost demand it.

Peter Pettigrew had to go…

Harry arrived at the apartment building where Peter lived when he wasn't working for Tottenhouse Greenery, a potions supply company in Wiltshire.

Harry used Muggle means to pick the door – as a halfblood who'd grown up mostly muggle, Peter maintained a Muggle identity – and walked inside. Pettigrew was snoring in a chair.

Harry quickly stunned the traitorous piece of filth and transfigured him into a beautiful white mouse. Since it wasn't self transfiguration, Peter wouldn't be able to reverse it. The mouse would be susceptible to the traditional life span of rodents – rather than an animagus' lengthy life span.

Harry apparated to the gymnasium of the school he had attended in Little Whinging. He suspected the children of the second grade class might enjoy a new class pet.

Harry was glad to volunteer Peter Pettigrew for this duty.

Harry stalked invisible through the empty school. He arrived at the correct classroom and noted by the placard next to the door that the same woman was teaching in the room as had taught him and Dudley.

The cage he remembered from when he'd been in school was still there. It had two mice already inside it, along with an automatic feeder and watering mechanism. It really was a nice contraption. Peter should love his new home.

Harry placed the mouse-Pettigrew into the cage. Then he added some magical enhancements to the device. He made the entire cage impervious to breakage. He also sealed the door to the device for as long as the mouse-Pettigrew was still alive.

He enervated the small beast as he was halfway across the room. He could hear frantic squeaking… Pettigrew had already understood something of his fate. He would never betray anyone this time around…Harry wouldn't permit any threats to his younger self.

Not even from the 'good friend' Peter Pettigrew. May Merlin favor him and end his life soon.

Harry apparated away as soon as he closed the classroom door.

He should have felt somewhat guilty for what he'd done…but he felt nothing. The longer he stayed in this timeline the colder he became. First the infertility curses; then the dispatching of Pettigrew.

Who knew? Perhaps Harry would kill the non-Death Eater Severus Snape just to round out his revenge – and to ensure the horrible twisted mind never interacted with Harry Potter in any way.

Harry returned to the White Estate and walked up the stairs to the third floor. He had a blood ritual to conduct. It was meant to grant newborn babies protection in their first few years. It was powerful magic. Not as powerful as willing sacrificial magic, but powerful still.

Harry had worked out that he could use his own blood to protect the newborn Harry.

It was Harry's second gift on the day of his birth. Something this important deserved some powerful gifts.

Harry began the letting of his blood and the chanting the old language with a look of extreme happiness on his face.

The timeline had changed – and not changed. Voldemort was dead; Harry Potter was alive and unscarred. James and Lily would survive. Harris Potter was the Minister of Magic.

Things were different.

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	7. Unintended Consequences

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**Chapter 7: Unintended Consequences**

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_August 8, 1980_

Albus Dumbledore projected an air of immortality. Sure he'd been killed in the original timeline, but no one had expected it to happen. People expected the old man to live to be six hundred _without_ the benefit of a Philosopher's Stone.

In this timeline, he seemed not only immortal but also impervious to all the demands that he be sacked from Hogwarts. He'd lost every other position he'd held in the British government, but he couldn't be dislodged from the ancient castle.

"I wonder if he's got blackmail material on the Board of Governors or something…"

Harry was doing something incredibly stupid. He was tired of waiting for Dumbledore's natural fall from grace. He'd decided to _help_ it along.

He had spent the last week, off and on, searching the Forbidden Forest for something he knew had to be there. There was no way a basilisk could grow to 22 meters in length if it didn't regularly feed. The acromantulas had all feared the massive beast, even though they refused to speak its name.

The conclusion: There was an entrance to the Chamber of Secrets somewhere in the Forest.

Harry had narrowed down the places where it couldn't be. The only major areas were near where the acromantulas nested and where a pack of pygmy cerberi were reputed to roam.

Of course the entrance wound up being very near to the acromantulas. Harry had to kill quite a number of them before he was able to have a moment to ponder the strange entrance.

He tried hissing at the rune-inscribed "tree." That did nothing. He looked around the entire thing and tried to decipher some of the runes. Then he conjured a snake and tried speaking to it.

"_Open up."_

Bang. A massive noise echoed through the Forest. The "tree" trunk opened revealing a deep, curved tunnel swirling into the ground.

Harry vanished the conjured snake and followed the path. The tree sealed itself up and Harry used a simple _Lumos_ to light his way.

It took nearly an hour to move through the filthy tunnel before he arrived in a large room. Harry popped into the Chamber of Secrets from behind one of the statues in the massive room. He'd been so preoccupied with his original battle that he'd, foolishly, never come back to investigate the place.

Harry had had the curiosity beaten out of him at a young age. It was another reason to hate Dumbledore.

Harry opened the main entrance to the chamber and prepared his efforts. He hoped the end results weren't too devastating…. But he didn't really care one way or the other. The only people in the building right now were Filch, Dumbledore, and a few of his rather unhappy 'guests.'

Harry wasn't doing this 'for the greater good.' There was no such justification. He was doing this to ensure that Albus Dumbledore never, ever got involved in the newborn Harry Potter's life.

Pettigrew was handled.

Dumbledore was next.

Snape had left the country – but was fair game if he ever returned.

Trelawney was the only other member of the Deadly Quartet…and Harry was monitoring her.

Today's action would be simple and indisputable and merciless.

Harry walked back into the Chamber of Secrets. He stopped just in front of the revolting statue of Salazar Slytherin. _"Speak to me, Greatest of the Hogwarts Four."_

Pensieves were handy things. Harry was grateful to have owned one in the old timeline – which aided him in preparing for this moment.

The massive basilisk took only moments to push her way into the room. Harry, of course, had his eyes closed. _"Come with me. You have work to do."_

"_You are not the master."_

"_I am your new master. I killed the old one."_

The snake was quiet. _"What am I to do?"_

"_Follow behind me. I am setting you loose in the school. Attack with your teeth and head. Do not kill with your eyes."_

"_It is my strongest weapon."_

"_It does not serve my purpose."_

The snake was silent. Harry assumed it meant the snake would do as told. To be honest, he didn't care what the snake got up to. Just so long as the whole thing was devastating.

Harry led the basilisk from the Chamber through the series of caverns that led to the entrance into Hogwarts. Harry drew his wand and sent five powerful bludgeoning curses at some of the old masonry. It was enough to weaken a bit of the floor support, but the rest would have to be done by the basilisk.

"_Break into the school. Destroy anything you can."_

"_I'm not to survive?"_

"_Probably not."_

"_I understand. It was a long, damp life…"_

"_Thank you_," Harry hissed. He felt a pang of remorse for the suicide mission he'd just condemned the basilisk to follow. He heard the battered against the weakened stones that held the bathroom floor in place. He ran back to the Chamber entrance, went inside, and sealed it. After a thousand years the chamber would no longer be a secret… But they still wouldn't be able to get inside.

Harry retraced his steps after doing a bit of investigation inside the chamber. No hidden rooms – no valuable manuscripts – nothing, save for the basilisk, to consider the space a Chamber of Secrets.

History was funny that way.

The reputation the Chamber had acquired was far greater than its actuality.

Poor Dumbledore and the twelve members of the Board of Governors, who were now meeting in an angry session, wouldn't see the humor in that.

Harry did.

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_August 17, 1980_

Justice, _when_ it came, was swift in the wizarding world. The basilisk had died – and been the subject of three consecutive issues of the _Daily Prophet_. Dumbledore had been fired as Headmaster moments after the Board determined the entrance point of the beast.

The fact he'd had to kill the thing – and get his mortal wounds healed by his phoenix – was immaterial to the livid Board. A basilisk had been within a few hundred feet of their children and grandchildren. Dumbledore had known or at least suspected…as had hundreds of years worth of Headmasters. But Dumbledore got the blame that day.

The Board had looked at the rest of the candidates and passed over Slughorn, McGonagall, and Hector Wintergreen, the Runes instructor. Professor Drebmier taught Herbology and was one hundred nine years old – and looked older. She never had a shot. The consensus candidate became Filius Flitwick, Charms Professor and former Dueling Champion.

He would be the first 'half breed' ever made Headmaster of Hogwarts. Very few people complained. Most of the ones likely to do so were in Azkaban.

Harry closed up the newest edition of the _Prophet_ – which discussed in detail a number of bizarre, probably true allegations about Dumbledore's years as a Transfiguration professor – and wondered what sort of shenanigans a free-in-the-wind Dumbledore might get up to.

He wondered if he needed to start tracking the old man like he did with Trelawney…

Suddenly he was up out of his chair. He hadn't checked on the recordings made by Trelawney's necklace in a few days. He moved quickly through the rooms of the White Estate until he had his hands on the recording crystals.

A quick tap of his wand and he was listening. The knot in Harry's stomach began to dissipate…until disaster struck.

The old fraud had just summoned a house elf and was half way through asking for a cheap bottle of goblin wine when she began choking and sputtering.

The voice that came out of her mouth afterward was one Harry knew well: the voice of Fate.

"_The Master of Time and Death unhinged the world a bit._

_He lifted the yoke of Fate from one so young and placed_

_The bit into his own unyielding mouth. For good or ill? _

_One line of time has ended; the Dark Lord was vanquished._

_Countless time lines unravel and unveil their dark borders._

_Was the Dark Lord the worst possible Fate a world could_

_Have endured? Terror, pain, fear, and blood approach._

_Let the Master know. His battles are not ended; his young_

_Charge is not yet made safe from the cruel whims of Time."_

Harry listened to the demonic voice a dozen times before he was sure of every word. The meaning was all too clear.

Harry the baby wasn't safe exactly, but the new prophesy didn't condemn an infant to carry the fate of a nation.

Harry the elder still had work to do – "terror, pain, fear, and blood." It sounded like someone was playing from Voldemort's rulebook. He speculated on who: all the known Death Eaters from the original timeline were dead or imprisoned. A few dozen new ones had been unmasked, but there were no guarantees the Aurors had caught them all.

Was it a Death Eater building a new power base?

Was it a Dark Lord come from abroad to conquer Britain?

What about those Death Eaters talking about Voldemort's wife and child. Was that connected somehow? Would this woman rise up in her husband's place?

Was it a threat no one suspected…a more competent sort of Fudge climbing the ladder inside the Ministry or a mad Potions Master about become Mr. Hyde?

Harry had, according to the prophecy, brought the mess to pass. He felt obligated to see it through to rights. He thought now of a lesson he'd learned when _that_ woman's accountant uncle, a squib more or less expelled from the Weasleys, had contracted cancer.

Harry had cured the cancer in his lung. But then the man had still died four months later of a completely different cancer in his kidney. What had the Muggle doctor explained to Arthur? 'Cancers get big and effectively stunt or kill off all the other cancers in a body. When we get rid of the main cancer sometimes the other ones can begin to grow again. Sometimes they grow with a vengeance.'

Voldemort had been a massive cancer. Had he been restraining this new threat? And his death enabled it to be free? It seemed _possible_. It was unfortunate.

But what to do?

Waiting was not Harry Potter's strength.

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_August 27, 1980_

He'd agonized about this decision for days before he committed himself. Harry Potter was personally going to break into the Department of Mysteries for a second time in his life.

He wasn't supposed to be in this time…and now there was an official prophesy logged in the Department of Mysteries about him. Talk about being subtle.

He couldn't decide if it was vague enough not to be noticed…or ominous enough to be the talk of the Department. Judging by the way he'd been scared at hearing the horrifying words, Harry leaned toward the prophecy being the talk of the department. He didn't really believe that Unspeakables didn't have a method for learning about the contents of prophecies – someone had to initially record them, after all. Were they obliviated of the knowledge once the spheres were made?

Or perhaps not… After all someone had amended the prophecy between "Voldemort ?" to "Voldemort + Harry Potter." Someone knew the events of that prophecy well enough to modify the tag on it after Halloween 1981 of the original timeline.

Harry had to go in… Or could he use his Imperius trick again? Hell, all his plans were changing moment to moment. He _really_ did not want to go into the Department of Mysteries ever again.

Harry changed his mind…again.

Instead of using the hairs he'd plucked from one Neil Bullrush, an Unspeakable in the Hall of Prophecies, Harry decided to _use _Neil Bullrush.

The man didn't need to touch the prophecy. He needed only to knock it off the shelf…accidentally.

Harry apparated to where he knew Mr. Bullrush used the Floo to enter the Ministry. As an Unspeakable the aging wizard refused to have a Floo connection in his own house – a security risk.

Harry waited for nearly thirty minutes before the short, gray wizard appeared. Harry waited a moment to ensure the area in front of the Green Goblin pub outside Ottery St. Catchpole was clear. He stunned the Unspeakable and then apparated away with him.

Neil Bullrush would be a couple minutes later than usual to work this morning. He'd also be extremely klutzy.

The man was bound quickly with ropes once Harry got him to a clear open field in Hertfordshire. No one would be looking for a wizard here. Harry pocketed the man's wand and did a search for portkeys or other magical artifacts. He had nothing, a rather lax approach to personal security.

Harry woke the wizard up. Then he cast the Imperius Curse before Neil Bullrush had any clear idea what was going on.

"You will answer my questions."

"Yes," came the hollow voice.

"You work in the Hall of Prophesies?"

"Yes, most days."

"Did you register a new prophecy about a week ago, referencing the 'Dark Lord'?"

"Merlin, yes. It was awful."

"You know the contents?"

"All the staff heard it. To think Trelawney of all people…"

Harry stopped the man. The whole situation was worse than he'd expected, worse than he'd feared.

"Does anyone outside the Department of Mysteries know?"

"No. No outsiders have been inside the Department in months…"

"How many Unspeakables are there?"

"Full time?"

"How many Unspeakable have heard about the prophecy?"

"Forty or fifty, I'd guess."

"Can any of them talk about it?"

"Not voluntarily. Not about anything they hear in their work…"

Harry's mind flew over his options…all the possibilities. He could destroy the sphere, but everyone already knew it. (Just like all the Unspeakables likely knew of the prophecy concerning Harry and Voldemort…the bastards.)

Would it be worthwhile to have it destroyed? If it was the only copy, then yes. But the words were also inside forty or fifty people. People who might wear trinkets to prevent Memory Charms…people who would be missed if they had accidents.

"Is there a ledger where all the prophecies get recorded?"

"Yes."

"I want you to remove the tag from the new prophecy, but do not touch the sphere. Leave it in place. Remove the tags from another hundred spheres…destroy those tags, too. Modify or destroy the places in the records where the Trelawney prophecy appears. Can you do that?"

"Yes."

"Make it look accidental if possible. Don't get caught."

The dull-eyed wizard nodded. Harry released him and finally said, "At seven thirty this evening, you will develop a high fever. It will last for three days. Check yourself into St. Mungo's tomorrow morning, as early as you can go. As soon as you walk into the door, your will shall return to you, but you will lose the last two weeks worth of memories…"

The wizard apparated away. He wasn't even struggling against the mental bond Harry had temporarily created with him. What was with all the weak wizards who worked for the Department of Mysteries? Were they the best the Ministry could find…

He apparated back to the White Estate and hoped he'd made the right decision. Destroying the prophecy could attract attention. Arranging for the prophecy to be lost among tens of thousands of other spheres wouldn't be as dramatic…and the dulling effects of time would do the rest.

Eventually people would forget. Harry hoped it was enough.

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_September 1, 1980_

A gray bearded man sat in his office deep inside the Ministry of Magic. He was appointed by no Minister of Magic. He answered to no Wizengamot Elder. He was a bit of a law unto himself.

Everything that happened inside the Department of Mysteries was his responsibility. Colleagues called him Tasker, just as every previous head of the department was known as Tasker. His wife knew none of this, of course. Wives were never told. She believed he still held a position with the Committee on Experimental Charms.

Tasker did, of course, continue to work for the Committee…in an advisory capacity. Most of his time was spent on Level Nine. Heading the Department of Mysteries was a lot of work.

Today, and for the last several weeks, Tasker had been attempting to put together the pieces of a mystery.

That locket mess – what with the Slytherin locket exploding when that poor man had been working on it – hadn't seemed too odd at the time. But things only kept getting stranger.

The disappearance of a few people, including the recent Hogwarts graduate Peter Pettigrew, was remarked upon on a few other jots of paper. He also had the recent killings of those who had spoken before the Truth Commission written down.

He had a newspaper clipping with the image of a massive dead basilisk.

Then he had a page out of the Prophecy Ledger. The entire page's contents were destroyed – seventeen entire prophecy spheres were now inaccessible to his researchers because of the error.

It seemed the most interesting recent prophecy concerning Voldemort and someone labeled the Master of Time and Death – a much more disturbing title, Tasker thought, than Voldemort – had utterly disappeared onto one of the hundred-plus shelves in the Hall of Prophecies.

People who had made their way up the ranks of the Unspeakables didn't believe in luck or coincidence or chance. They believed in the actions of man…in the own things they had done to secure their positions.

Tasker thought he saw the glimpse of one or more men in these latest happenings. What they meant, he didn't know. Could it be the rise of a new dark lord? Setting a basilisk on a rampage seemed to suggest it, but doing so when Hogwarts was empty seemed to say something else…

The clues were very confused.

Slytherin's locket had obviously been cursed with a variety of dark enchantments, but no one had determined what they were. That prophecy sphere spoke of a new darkness…and it too was gone. How had someone twice infiltrated his department, assuming these 'accidents' weren't accidents. The people who knew about the locket wouldn't know how to access the Prophecy Register…

Were there other clues Tasker hadn't identified? And what did a new Hogwarts graduate have to do with any of this? And why did the Prophecy speak of 'unhinging the world' and 'countless time lines.' Did they now have a time walker in their midst? It was rumored Merlin could move forward and backward through time, moving and changing things at will… Tasker had never believed stories like that before, but he'd never had such odd things happen. He'd never heard a prophecy like the one from a month ago.

Tasker decided to devote some resources to the problem. Perhaps he'd find some more clues. Perhaps he'd uncover some additional oddities or find a new Mystery to research and solve.

Perhaps he'd get to the bottom of all this nonsense. He didn't like people mucking around inside his department. No, not at all.

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_September 20, 1980_

Septimus Crouch, a distant relation to that awful, imprisoned Barty Crouch, apparated onto the road outside what was listed as an old magical estate. The Department had recently noticed renewed magic emanating from the place.

Like all mysteries, this one deserved an explanation.

He surveyed the grounds. Everything looked neat and tidy. Either the place was unoccupied, but had a groundskeeper, or someone had taken up residence in the former White Estate.

Septimus pulled out an old Invisibility Cloak and walked up the long road to the massive building. A Muggle named Thomas Franklin owned the place…and there was definitely someone living here. No automobile…

Septimus was excited. He hadn't had a genuine magical mystery in quite some time.

He opened the door and walked inside the building. He wordlessly cast a few detection spells. There was definitely faded magic inside here – some wards of ancient design and a few other unclear magical signatures.

He walked down the hallway until he came to the first set of wards. He walked inside…and was immediately taken back to his days at Hogwarts when Madam Purcell had taught him to read tea leaves. Septimus didn't have an ounce of divinatory ability, but the class had been amusing, far better than History with the young, dreadfully boring Binns.

Septimus never noticed another person sneak up behind him. He never even saw the wand that stunned him.

He slumped forward, unable to move. His investigation had come to an abrupt end.

Harry Potter had felt the other wizard's presence the moment he set foot on the White Estate – the wards didn't keep anyone out, but they did warn Harry as to what was going on.

"It seems someone has cottoned onto 'Thomas Franklin' buying the White Estate…" Harry was working through the implications out loud.

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_September 21, 1980_

It took Harry a while to seal up the White Estate and head for his safehouse with his stunned prisoner in tow.

He would obviously need to hide himself better if he'd already been tracked down. Hiding in plain sight seemed like a good idea, but it rarely worked as planned. Too many fiction writers had embraced the concept…leaving even wizards the world over underprotected.

He bound his prisoner into a chair and administered truth serum before waking the man.

"What's your name?"

"Septimus." He clopped his mouth shut to avoid saying anything else.

"Last name or first?"

"First name."

Harry had to hold back a smile. The veritaserum was working, but this man had been taught how to work within the truth serum to say as little as possible.

"What's your last name?"

"Crouch."

"Any relation to Bartemius Crouch?"

"Second cousin."

Harry decided to use loaded questions as much as possible. "How long have you worked for the Department of Mysteries?"

"Twenty-nine years."

Harry nodded briefly. "Why were you investigating the White Estate?"

"We investigate mysteries." Even through the drug, the man's tone was hateful.

"Explain the mystery that brought you there."

A moment passed. He was considering what to say…. "Old, formerly magical estates rarely get new magic flowing into them."

"You track magic throughout Britain?"

"Yes."

"Why didn't you track Unforgivables during the war?"

"We did."

Harry got off track for a moment; this was a genuine curiosity of his. Why had the Ministry fared so poorly in both timelines when dealing with Voldemort. "Explain why the Ministry didn't act on the information."

"It never left the Department…"

Harry gritted his teeth. "You tracked the use of the Unforgivables. Other offices tracked other information, including underage magic, and no one shared. Correct?"

"Yes."

Harry loathed bureaucracies. It was a shame that he'd helped foist his grandfather into heading the current mess of a Ministry of Magic. Nothing could destroy a bureaucracy: things could infect and twist them, but never destroy and end them, save for the ending of a civilization.

"How many mysteries outside the department are people dispatched to investigate in any given month?"

"It varies. Five or twenty…"

That was a low number. The name Thomas Franklin and the White Estate might stay inside people's memories for quite some time…plus there was this new prophesy in effect. Harry did not like his life right now.

"What did you expect to find at the White Estate?"

"A magical vagrant, perhaps. Or a clutch of Death Eaters living there. We haven't caught them all, of course."

What should he do, Harry wondered. He'd somehow attracted the attention of the Unspeakables – but not for the right reasons. Harry had used the Imperius Curse on two Unspeakables to force them to steal from or otherwise sabotage the Department of Mysteries, but this man was here investigating merely why an old magical estate was putting out magic again.

It was the littlest things that foul up the world…. Harry frowned.

"Why were you looking at the White Estate in the first place?"

"The Head Unspeakable, Tasker, had us comparing every instance of magic with known wizards and witches. We're investigating every place not known to the Ministry as the registered home of a magical person…"

Harry felt a smile creep across his face. Perhaps these people were looking for him – for the right reasons.

"Why?"

"I've never understood Tasker."

"It was a random decision to have Unspeakables searching Britain for unexplained magical signatures?"

"If you say so…"

Harry had to chuckle to himself. Whoever had trained Septimus Crouch in anti-interrogation techniques had done a good job. But very few could resist the Imperius Curse.

The curse settled into Crouch. One could resist Veritaserum if one knew how to answer little or misdirect. No one – save those who could throw off the Imperius itself – could avoid answering under the Curse.

"Tell me why you came to the White Estate."

"Tasker is looking for someone."

"Who?"

"Someone who had been interfering in the internal department operations."

Confirmation. It made Harry extremely nervous. "Why the White Estate?"

"It's one of nearly a hundred places we're looking into…"

That made Harry feel a bit safer. It had been sheer bad luck that the White Estate had been added onto a bureaucratic list.

"Tell me who this Tasker is."

"I do not know. No one does."

Harry believed that. There had been a Tasker at the Ministry when Harry had been Head Auror – and no one knew who that man was, either.

Harry stunned Septimus Crouch. He had to think and decide on his next actions. It wouldn't be right just to kill or maim this man because of his unluckiness in drawing the White Estate. But he couldn't just Memory Charm the man and send him on his way.

Memory charms could be broken, of course, and folks like Unspeakables might even be regularly tested for them.

He's used the Imperius Curse to force two Unspeakables to forget what they'd done for Harry…but no one had expected them to have any memories of breaking into the Department of Mysteries. Septimus Crouch was on an official mission – he couldn't just return with a huge hole in his memories, could he?

He needed to think… He was being hunted and didn't intend to get caught. He had to slow things down a bit, be cautious, be cagey.

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_October 31, 1980_

Harry Potter had gone into exile in America temporarily. Septimus Crouch was currently inside a magical trunk accompanying Harry. He still had not decided how to handle the wizard who'd come to the White Estate. There were no good solutions…. The man was alive but was no longer free to do as he pleased, not unconscious in a trunk like a certain Auror Harry had known much earlier in his life.

He sat in the small apartment he'd arranged in Queens. This was the first time he'd set foot inside since he'd arranged for it.

He was doodling on a scrap of paper as he tried to decide how to make it safely back into Britain. He really wanted to lower his profile…but hiding at the White Estate hadn't exactly worked, had it?

Perhaps he needed a more public persona, one registered with the Ministry, one no one would think to investigate….

It shouldn't be too hard to create some credentials that would withstand scrutiny, should it?

Harry stood up from his rickety table and threw a coat on. He needed to walk off his excess energy. He decided to head over to Magister Avenue, the wizarding section of New York City. It was only a few dozen blocks. In the cold morning air it would help to calm him and clear his mind.

He walked into the wizard library first. He was trying to finalize a few details on his new persona before venturing back into Britain.

He grabbed a stack of annuals from Australia's Gandyturn School of Magic and was heading for a table when he spotted a copy of the _Daily Prophet_.

He almost dropped the books from his hands.

_**Kantor Line Massacred; Werewolf Greyback Involved, Killed**_

He snatched up the newspaper and read. He hadn't thought of Daphnis Kantor – Voldemort's rumored wife – or her child in quite some time. The Death Eaters had been premature, it seemed, in assuming her dead.

_A bloody scene confronted this reporter, Rita Skeeter writes, when I arrived at the Kantor Estate in Moribund Westley, Devonshire, yesterday. Seventeen members of the Kantor family, including famous dark witch Daphnis Kantor, were found dead. Ranging in age from one hundred-plus to a toddler still in nappies, the entire Kantor line is now extinguished._

Voldemort's child…Voldemort's child was dead. But, this massacre was another jolt to the calm. First the witnesses at the Truth Commission – then the prophesy that few knew about – then _this_.

_The only sign about who might have committed this heinous act was the presence of the vile werewold Fenrir Greyback, known for his attacks on children and his support for the vanquished You-Know-Who. No Auror would comment officially, but several mentioned that they firmly believed Greyback had been part of the attacking force._

_What no one at the Ministry of Magic has yet suggested is a motive for this attack. While much of the Kantor family remained neutral in the last war, a few notables followed the call of the Ministry and a few followed You-Know-Who, especially Daphnis Kantor, rumored paramour of You-Know-Who himself. I, for one, do not expect a satisfactory answer any time soon given the general intellectual apathy of the entire Auror force – but I know my rabid readers would wish for a clear and immediate answer as to who has done such a thing…._

Harry Potter also wanted an answer to that question.

The prophesy Sybil Trelawney had uttered was undoubtedly in force. History had changed, but it hadn't changed into peace. Something Harry had done or not done in this new timeline had unsettled something. Voldemort was surely dead, but a new form of evil had just firmly announced itself.

Something wicked this way comes.

Harry sat in the library, his Australian research into possible new identities forgotten. He tried to piece together what the newspaper article meant…and got nowhere. It was maddening.

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